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Chapter Text

An odd noise like the cracking of branches made 10-year-old and soon-to-be Adventurer Extraordinaire Vicky (“no journey for two more years, Vicky, you can be an adventurer or whatever then, for now there’s weeds to pull—” “…yes, Gram-gram…”) pause midstride. The path home from school was rather short, a dusty stretch of gravel and dirt with a few trees dotted to either side. The grass had not grown so tall as to hide any creatures, save only for the smallest or most determined of pokemon, and even then not for long. 

The sound rang out again. “KkkuuKKkuk.”

If this is what I think it is…  

A small shadow at the base of one of the trees moved. Vicky’s eyes snapped to it as if drawn by a magnemite.

“Oh my goodness!” Vicky breathed, “A mimikyu!” She crouched slowly, keeping her gaze fixed on the tiny trembling figure. “What are you doing here, little buddy?”

The doll drew back, shaking. “kuuUUkkk!”

Vicky froze. “Oh my gosh I’m so sorry!” she whispered, frantically putting her hands up in a universal gesture of peace. “Are you okay, are you hurt? Are—”

As if soothed by her panicked rambling, the mimikyu’s trembles gradually slowed. Vicky stared at it, fascinated. The head of the doll tipped to the side at an unnerving angle, the blank button eyes staring straight ahead. But on the chest area, Vicky could see two more smaller holes, out of which the tiny pokemon peered out tentatively.

Vicky grinned. “You’re so cool!” She mumbled to herself, “I can’t believe I found a Mimkyu–”

“KkKKk!” Mimikyu began to shake again, drawing back.

“... Sorry, I don’t…” Vicky paused.

“Kukk!” The pokemon awkwardly swished its tail, bobbing its ears in an exaggerated motion.

“Your tail…? Oh, a pikachu costume?”

“KkkkuuKKuk!” The mimikyu looked up hopefully.

Vicky was silent for a moment, then her eyes widened. “Oh! Don’t worry!” She beamed at the small doll, “pikachu are great, too, but Mimikyu are better! You’re not just a ghost, you’re a fairy! But I don’t think people know that yet — that makes you extra super special—”

Mimikyu began shaking like a leaf once more.

“— and I can’t believe you’re in Kanto, this isn’t your region – maybe poaching? That would be horrible, I hope you’re okay—”

“KuuukkKKuuKukk!” Mimikyu rocketed into her chest.

“—Oomph!” Vicky wheezed, then stared in shock. Mimikyu immediately took the opportunity to dig its feelers into her shirt, gripping tightly and almost seeming to fuse to the material. After a few seconds of shocked staring from the human and fearful but excited trembling from the pokemon, Vicky’s grin split even wider than before.

A passing pidgey could have sworn there were straight-up cartoon stars in her eyes.

“Oh my gosh yes! I’m going to love you so much! You are the best!” She wrapped mimikyu in a small hug, and the little ghost type immediately whined and gripped tighter. Vicky giggled.

“Hey Mimikyu! My plan is to win the league and show everyone how awesome my pokemon are. Wanna come with me?”

Mimikyu immediately started nodding so fast the costume made a thwacking sound as it flopped. Vicky laughed again, and squeezed mimikyu in a hug.

“Awesome! We’re going to be best buds and take the world by storm, just you wait!”

An hour had passed since Vicky had encountered her partner and platonic pokemon soulmate Mimikyu, and she was still over the moon. A mimikyu! One of her favorites! She always wanted a mimikyu! She was going to give him so much love and hugs and—

She squealed unashamedly as Mimikyu hugged her arm tighter. 

It had been long enough, however, that her rationality had begun to return, even despite still being face to face with an adorable creature like Mimikyu. 

Her parents… well.

There was a reason they had told her to stay far away from her Aunt Agatha’s ‘mons. Ghost types were known to be vicious , vindictive, playful, and all around dangerous. Not her Mimikyu though, he was the best.

… Her parents wouldn’t see it that way.

And then Vicky had an amazing idea!

“Mimikyu!” she whispered excitedly, “go inside my hat!”

“...KkkuuKkk?” Mimikyu tilted his head.

“My parents will probably not be too happy when I bring you home—and there’s no way I’m leaving you behind, we’re partners now and forever—”

“KKuukkk!” The shadowy tentacles on her arm tightened, and Vicky idly petted the shivering body of the doll.

“—so if you go inside my hat, we can slowly get them used to ghost pokemon before introducing you! And I can carry you around everywhere!” Vicky beamed.

Mimikyu seemed ecstatic at the idea. He immediately leaped into her hat and nestled at the top, the head of the doll contorting until the skull looked caved in, empty eyes pressed up against the tail of the costume. Two tiny ghost eyes peeked out from the dome of the hat. Vicky suppressed another squeal of overflowing cuteness. Vicky promptly put it on her head.

It was an odd sensation, cold and wet like it should be slimy, prickling like insects on her skull—the ghost-sensation of slimy, but when she ran her hand over her hair it came out dry.

“So cool,” Vicky whispered. Mimikyu chattered happily and did a little wiggle before falling silent. “Stealth mode engage!” Vicky murmured, giddy. She bounced along, back onto the gravel path home, rambling picking up speed as she approached the house.

“—we can get Aunt Agatha to mediate, since she has a lot of ghost-types, I’m sure she would love to meet you! And maybe I can get training tips, oh that would be the best! She’ll definitely help out with Mom and Dad, though, just you wait, I’m going to show them how awesome ghost and fairy types can be—”

Vicky fell silent as she reached her front door, pushing it open.

“Hey, mom, dad! I, uh…” Vicky trailed off seeing Growlie and the three training Growlithe in attack position, hackles raised, teeth bared. In the corner, Persian had her claws out, snarling. “Uhh…”

Her dad was glancing around at his pokemon, eyes alert, one hand on the taser holster in his belt. Mom had grabbed the cutlery and was gripping it like a weapon. Not two seconds passed before her parents realized that all the pokemon in the house were staring at Vicky.

Or more specifically, Vicky’s hat.

“Vicky…” Her mother began calmly, but the tone in her voice promised impending doom. “What. Did you do this time?”

Vicky winced.

“Busted,” she whispered. Her hat wiggled sadly.

The Scolding, as the incident was soon termed, was legendary.

Her father’s voice could be heard from across the neighborhood, Vicky was sure, and the screaming from her mother when she revealed her precious partner made a flock of pidgey flee the berry orchard. 

Rude.

Despite their best intentions, the family soon discovered that prying Mimikyu away from Vicky was an exercise in futility, and also quite potentially lethal.

Vicky was pretty sure the only reason Mimikyu didn’t immediately claw someone’s hand was her desperate pleading and growlithe-eyed stare at both her parents and the shadow pokemon to oh my Arceus please don’t maul each other, Mom, Dad, he’s fine, Mimikyu loves, me, no I’m not dying, nobody is dying, ghost pokemon are friendly, I promise, just look at Agatha! Mimikyu stop trying to kill Persian—

They… reached an agreement.

Vicky was grounded for life. Both for bringing an unknown pokemon home, for approaching a ghost type, which were well known to be dangerous— no, Vicky, you can’t just say ‘they want to be friends,’ ghost types are well-known to be vengeful! What is something happened to you? The only reason we can even keep your… mimikyu is that we have connections to Arceusdamn Agatha! Why can’t you just understand, so help me Vicky —nearly giving her mother a heart attack, terrorizing a squad of growlithe in training, and ruining her favorite flannel shirt.

She hadn’t even realized there were holes. Whoops.

Well, at least it would only be a couple years before her journey. No trips to the forest without supervision, she was escorted to school, and the chores she was expected to do around the house doubled.

“Worth it,” she whispered to her hat, and it gave her a happy wiggle.

That still didn’t stop her from rescuing a feebas in the school pond.

She could feel her partner cackling from atop her head at her mother’s dead-eyed stare.

Vicky sighed and let herself collapse onto the bed, finally having escaped her reckoning.

She looked outside her window. It was dark out. The Scolding had lasted hours.

Vicky groaned.

Well. It wasn’t like she couldn’t understand where they were coming from. From their perspective, their excitable, overeager, 10-year-old daughter had just brought home one of the most dangerous pokemon types in the world, and was letting it rest on her head. As a hat. They had no knowledge of Mimikyu, no understanding of the bond Vicky and Mimikyu had forged unusually quickly, and no context for why any ghost type would follow a young child other than expected carnage.

Vicky winced.

Yeah, she would probably have scolded herself for life, too. Not your best move, Victoria Ferrous.

Her gaze drifted towards her hat, where Mimikyu was hiding. Or, where she expected Mimikyu to be hiding.

He was not there.

Vicky immediately sat straight up, desperately looking around the room—before letting out an explosive sigh of relief. The Mimikyu-hat was posted in front of the open doors of her closet, clothes haphazardly piled and falling out of drawers. She spied one of her flannels that she had been looking for yesterday—so that’s where it went!—and groaned. 

Part of her punishment: double chores. Looks like the ol’ closet would get a deep cleaning sooner rather than later.

Vicky frowned. She glanced back at Mimikyu, who hadn’t moved. 

“Mimikyu?” She gently probed, “you doing ok?”

“Kkukkk,” a tiny voice came from under the hat.

Vicky tilted her head, looking closer. Wait were those… stars in Mimikyu’s eyes?

Yes. Cartoonish, sparkly, glittering eyes that were some of the most adorable, effective puppy eyes Vicky had ever seen. Never mind that this was a ghost type, never mind that this was one of the most terrifying pokemon that could kill with a single glimpse at its true body (Vicky had never before been so glad that not much was known about pokemon in this strange new world, since her parents would absolutely never have let Mimikyu stay if they knew that little tidbit), this was her partner. And he was in awe. Of her closet.

Vicky slowly began to grin.

“Oh, Mimikyu, my dear,” she cackled, “I am going to get you so many costumes. ”

Mimikyu looked at her like she was Arceus.

Vicky’s smile grew softer. “Only the best for my partner.”

Vicky promptly found herself tangled in a vice-like cuddle hug the rest of the night.

At least Gram-gram was happy with the whole fiasco. Mostly.

“Hah!” She crowed, “now I finally have something to hold over that biddy Agatha’s head. A new ghost type!” She cackled. “Good work, girl.”

Vicky stared at her from the corner of her eyes. You’re the one who gives me the most chores in punishment, Gram-gram. But she wisely stayed silent.

Gram-gram was teaching her how to sew, after all.

What? Of course she wouldn’t let Mimikyu have some sub-par, generic, store-bought costume! Her partner deserved only the very best! And if that meant Vicky would have to suck it up and suffer through hours upon hours of sewing practice with Gram-gram, then she was going to do it, Arceus-dammit.

Luckily, Mimikyu seemed significantly more fascinated in learning the finer art of clothing creation than Vicky, and watched, enraptured, as Vicky stabbed her finger with a needle for the fifth time in a row.

The Milotic Debacle happened. And then was promptly resolved.

Agatha was absolutely ruthless in eviscerating the League officials that threatened not only her extended family’s Milotic flock, but her precious niece’s rare, never-before-seen ghost type.

Vicky was left with a suitable modicum of awe and terror at the carnage the overenthusiastic Ghost-type Elite left behind her.

“One day,” she murmured at her hat with sparkling eyes, “we’re going to be just as destructive.”

Mimikyu and Arcanine cackled and barked in agreement.

Vicky took stock of her bag as she swung herself on top of Arcanine, eagerly burying herself in the fluff. Pokemon grooming kit? Check. Tent and rations? Check. Pokeballs? Check. Brand new, Gram-gram approved, fully-stocked sewing kit for Mimikyu? Check!

“Who’s a good girl? You’re a good girl! Yes you are!” she mumbled into his fur. Arcanine yipped happily, prancing as Vicky adjusted her balance. Mimikyu wiggled atop her head, claws gently grasping the side of her hat and hair.

It had taken a little while to train Arcanine not to be terrified of Mimikyu. The evolution had helped, Arcanine now being a great deal stronger, and the two had soon become good friends, reaching a common understanding and love of their trainer.

Vicky’s heart turned to mush every time at the thought.

“Alright!” Vicky cheered, pumping a fist into the air, “let’s get this show on the road! Time to show that wimp Lance what we’re made of!”

Arcanine howled, and Mimikyu “kukk”-ed in agreement. She ignored her parents sighs of despair and her Gram-gram’s cackles in the background.

“To Pewter! Wait Arcanine not so faaaaaa—”

Chapter Text

Misty watched as Vicky’s majestic arcanine absolutely trashed Ash’s pokemon. The poor pidgeotto had been getting shaken about, covered in slobber, and released like a toy that had outlived its interest, attempting to flee only to get captured again in the large dog’s jaws with an almost insulting ease.

Misty did not envy Brock the slobber bath he was going to have to do to clean that poor bird. Because Ash sure as heck wouldn’t, and would have no idea where to even begin washing out his pidgeotto. If only he would take Brock up on the—frankly fantastic—offer to teach him pokemon grooming… 

I mean, come on! An aspiring professional breeder and groomer giving free lessons? On your own pokemon? You’d have to be an idiot to pass it up!

…Ash was an idiot.

Pidgeotto sagged to the ground under an onslaught of slobber, and was promptly returned. Ash sent out Squirtle, which… well, at least he had the type advantage?

Oh, and now Vicky was actually teaching Ash something. How on earth did she get him to listen to her? Misty had been trying the same thing for weeks!

Uh oh. Ash was getting frustrated. Misty sighed. She turned away from watching her idiot travel partner and back towards objectively the strangest person she had ever met. What interesting tactic would she call out now?

But… Vicky’s attention was only half on the battle against Pikachu, as she was… wrestling with her hat?

Misty blinked.

What?

The innocuous straw hat seemed to be… writhing. Every now and then, an inky black tendril of shadow peeked out over the brim, stabbing into the air, before a hand quickly caught it and stuffed it back under. Vicky’s attention was only half on Arcanine’s battle, commanding only the most basic of moves—“Dodge!” and “Go!”—before cutting herself off and hissing under her breath at her hat. A sudden jerk had the hat lurching towards the battlefield, where Arcanine was now trotting calmly away from the electric rat, before Vicky yanked her headwear back and hissed under her breath.

Misty strained to hear the girl’s voice as her lips moved feverishly quickly.

“No… stay… achu… fine… love… later…” Slowly, the writhing struggle of the straw hat ceased. Misty watched in morbid fascination as the shadows under the hat that she hadn’t even noticed up until now began to lighten, slowly drawing back into the center. A faint, eldritch buzzing in her ears like a subconscious danger siren gradually abated. It was like high-pitched noise suddenly turned off, made apparent by its sudden lack—in this case, a chorus of tinny screams that she hadn’t noticed had been ringing in the back of her mind.

Misty blinked again.

Immediately, her head felt clearer.

What the f—

In the background, Arcanine batted Pikachu away like swatting a fly.

“Pikachu!” Ash yelled. He sprinted over to his downed starter.

Misty snapped her head over to watch her travel partner scramble. Incensed, he unclipped another pokeball from his belt, and Charizard emerged in a beam of red light…

And immediately huffed, sitting back down, and ignored Ash’s increasingly desperate calls.

Misty sighed. Next to her, Brock sighed as well and stood up.

“Brock…” Misty began, then hesitated.

Brock turned back to glance at her. “Yeah, Misty?”

“Did you…” She trailed off into silence. Brock waited, but the words didn’t come. She glanced back over towards Vicky, who was commiserating with Arcanine over Charizard’s apparent refusal to fight.

Idiots, the lot of them.

Vicky’s straw hat was back on her head, as if it had never moved.

“Never mind.” Misty shook her head. She brushed herself off and stood up.

…Yeah, I’m staying away from this one mystery with a 10-foot pole.

The trainer in question promptly sauntered over to them with a skip in her step, as if the previous battle was nothing more than an afterthought — which, to be fair, it probably was for her, but Misty reminded herself never to mention that in Ash’s presence. There was only so much his inflated ego would withstand.

Her hat was still firmly back on her head, but Misty could swear that a tiny black tendril reached out towards Pikachu cradled in Ash’s arms before an absent wave of Vicky’s hand blocked her sight. When the hand moved away, the tendril was gone.

“…you were distracted!” she could hear Ash’s whining voice complain.

Vicky blinked at him and tilted her head as they approached. “Yeah, sorry about that.”

“Seriously,” Ash whined, “why is your starter so powerful?”

“Oh! Arcanine isn’t my starter!”

“WHAT?” Ash shouted. Misty winced at the volume.

“Nope!” Vicky cheerfully stated, “he’s my second pokemon! Or maybe third? Not sure about the order there, I’ve had him since he was a growlithe but captured him later… Hmm…”

“Then that wasn’t even a fair fight! I—”

“Ash,” Misty interrupted longsufferingly, “if she can beat you even while distracted, and without even using her starter, you clearly need more training.”

Ash frowned and looked away.

“Look,” Vicky said as she attempted to dispel the tension, “why don’t we head to the center? We can all heal our pokemon up after the battle—”

And of course, that was when Officer Jenny showed up.

As if this whole ordeal wasn’t bad enough.

“Shit! Cheese it!”

As they ran off back towards town, a shouting Jenny slowly shrinking in the distance behind them, Misty wondered once again what exactly that whole deal with Vicky’s hat was…

… and promptly wished she never knew as Blaine’s rhydon went sailing past and slammed into the wall of the volcano, with an expertly-sewn-but-still-clearly-a-costume of a charmander somehow standing on its own in the middle of the battlefield. The straw hat was now back on Vicky’s head; it had been used to toss the small doll into the arena like a sling, and was now balanced precariously atop Vicky’s cackling form.

The ends of the costume were slightly ripped from where the rhydon had caught it with a horn attack, right before the being inside the reanimated costume exploded into a potent rage that resulted in the rhydon being forcefully ejected from the battlefield at inhuman speeds.

Misty gulped at the crater in the wall, desperately trying to look away from the creature she could see in the gaps in the fabric. The otherworldly screeches were back, a constant, ringing sense of other and danger in the back of her mind.

She whispered under her breath: “What on earth…?”

Ash, too busy gaping just like her at the crater in the wall and nearly vibrating out of his seat, didn’t hear her. Brock, however, did.

He also seemed to be the only one not surprised.

“Yeah,” he said flatly, “that’s her starter. She used it against me as the first gym. Absolutely wrecked the place.” He rubbed his forehead. “No clue what it is. She says it’s a ‘mimikyu,’ but I’ve never heard of that pokemon.”

Well, that insane girl certainly didn’t use that pokemon against her gym, thank the Birds.

Misty watched as Vicky thankfully recalled the tiny ghost pokemon and sent out her dragonite—

She paused.

What is the world coming to where I’m happy to see a dragonite!?

She was going to get a headache. Scratch that, she was getting on already. Maybe she should be nicer to Golduck sometimes. This sucked.

“Apparently,” Brock continued, dead eyes still staring at the beatdown Vicky’s dragonite was giving Blaine’s growlithe, “the league tried to get involved a couple months ago but Elite Agatha literally browbeat them into submission. According to her, even if it’s a never-before-seen ghost type, it’s never good to separate ghosts from their trainers.”

Misty shivered.

“Vicky’s going to terrify everyone in the league,” she muttered to herself.

Brock grinned ruefully. “Yep.”

Misty watched in dull resignation as the second of Lance’s dragonite was sent careening past her face and smacked against the protective barrier, hard, in a more elegant rendition of the utter beatdown at Blaine’s gym.

From across the field, she could see Lance left staring at the tiny wriggling costume — this time, what would have been an adorable rendition of an Eevee, with the addition of a couple black wriggling tentacles peeking out from the bottom that now wrapped the whole picture straight back around to terrifyingly uncanny-valley — with his mouth open in speechless shock.

Him and the rest of the stadium. Even I still can't believe this is real and I've seen it before. 

Misty never thought she would think this thought, but she commiserated. With Lance.

What is the world coming to?

The arena fell to pin-drop silence, save for an unceasing salvo of unhinged cackles from a certain elderly lady that could just barely be heard coming from the Elite Box, before a loud roar of cheer exploded all around her. Misty dropped her head into her hands, feeling Brock’s commiserating pat on her shoulder.

Seriously. What. The. Fudge. Was that pokemon.

Chapter Text

Date of Report: Jul. 19, 2009                      Report ID: 870522

Report completed by: Agent A201, Sinnoh Police

Report Title: Ferrous Unown (Abbrev: FU)

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Form TI.R.34: Trainer Involved, Research Incident

Full name: Victoria “Vicky” Ferrous

Status: Ace Trainer                                      Pokedex ID: 1017

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Date of incident: Jul. 18, 2009                    Time of incident: Mid-afternoon

Location: Solaceon Ruins                            Sub-location:Room G02 “Grand Hall”

Personnel involved: Research Team SR28, Professor [REDACTED], Researcher [REDACTED], Researcher [REDACTED], Research Team SR26, Research Team SR29

Description:

The individual now identified as Trainer Victoria “Vicky” Ferrous entered the Solaceon Ruins by mid-afternoon on estimate, and based off of witness statements by various research teams (refer to reports submitted by SR26, SR29) wandered around the complex before reaching room G02, where Team SR28 is currently posted.

Upon walking into the room, Trainer Ferrous engaged in a conversation with several of the researchers, purportedly about their shared enthusiasm for pokemon. Trainer Ferrous was noted at several points to be bouncing from excitement, exclaiming “so cool” and variations thereof. Upon spotting the current translation project of Team SR28 (see SR.G02.A894 Fragment of Tablet) Trainer Ferrous wondered if the team was studying Unown, despite very little being currently known about the relationship between the Unown and the ancient language. Researchers were hesitant to disclose sensitive data in the collection process, which did not seem to bother Trainer Ferrous.

Trainer Ferrous theorized that Unown are byproducts of a concentration of ancient language taking a mind of its own, and requested to be able to test this theory.* Upon one of the researchers asking how she would do so, Trainer Ferrous purportedly replied “by trying to create more.”

Due to being placed in an understandable state of confusion and shock, none of the researchers were able to intervene before Trainer Ferrous apparently took action. Using only a pen and paper, Trainer Ferrous drew several variations of the same symbol (images attached at end of report) before one of them “flashed and peeled off of the page,” according to Researcher [REDACTED] in the form of Unown 29 (further images and initial research stages can be requested using form L.R.5), which trainer then proceeded to call “Unown Pi,” and exclaim “cool! Feel free to join your family,” at which the pokemon complied and left the room.

It is as of yet unclear whether this name is a nickname given by Trainer Ferrous for this pokemon or a potential classification of a new Forme.** Trainer Ferrous was unavailable for comment, as she had left the room in the intervening moments of what Researcher [REDACTED] termed to be “utter chaos”. Attempts were made to track Trainer Ferrous’s departure immediately upon notice of her disappearance, but this was made difficult by the fact that she possesses a Staraptor that can apparently reach Elite-pokemon-level speeds.***

Researchers have since attempted duplicating the creation, to no avail, despite copying Trainer Ferrous’s methods and procedure.  Researcher [REDACTED] posits that there was some alignment with the Gods of Creation and circumstance that afforded Trainer Ferrous the ability to create an Unown for a one-time use, while Researcher [REDACTED] has posited that each Forme can be created only once through writing, with subsequent instances of the pokemon to be produced through a different method. Both are unclear on the value of repeated trials of this experiment due to these hypotheses, but continue to test nonetheless. The currently accepted theory from Professor [REDACTED] posits that some form of understanding of the base form of the Unown is required to bring ancient language to life – whether that be understanding the writing, understanding the creation process, or understanding the true nature of Unown is yet to be determined. Professor [REDACTED] has noted that this line of research will likely continue for some time.

Several researchers have implied that Trainer Ferrous holds the ability to understand, read, and even write in the ancient language, a skill that might bring archeological research forward by several centuries. Professor [REDACTED] recommends opening dialogue with Kanto researchers to consult on this potential breakthrough.

*According to the interviewed research team, her actual words were more along the lines of “they’re a bunch of friendly living squiggles that wanted to see the world, so what if I made different squiggles? Would they want to see the world too?” which was subsequently translated into a potential theory by Professor [REDACTED].

**Note that researchers have begun using the term as a Forme name, and it shall likely be classified as such.

***Classification was judged from the compression and subsequent force of air gusts after pokemon departure, which reached a level that does not quite breach the sound barrier but certainly places the pokemon at Elite level of strength.

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Conclusion:

Due to her recent discoveries, Trainer Ferrous has been nominated by several researchers from SR28 to receive Researcher status from the Sinnoh Department of Historical Research. This nomination has been delayed due to international treaties with Kanto and Trainer Ferrous’s active status as a foreign trainer completing the Sinnoh Gym Circuit.

HQ in conjunction with Sinnoh Police to continue to monitor Trainer Victoria during her time in Sinnoh. HQ requests there be no obstructing measures save for standard trainer bylaws.*

Professor [REDACTED] and Research Team SR28 have requested initiation of talks with Kanto to open communication for potential research exchange. HQ notified, deliberation in progress.

Inquiries from the Sinnoh Department of National Security, as well as several Sinnoh businesses, have been made in the potential creation of new pokemon and its potential to impact the wealth and security of Sinnoh.

Do not antagonize Trainer Victoria Ferrous. I repeat, DO NOT ANTAGONIZE VICTORIA FERROUS. She somehow knows obscure research subjects better than people who were doing this for years, we do not want her mad at us because some moron couldn’t keep their ego in check. She also has been noted to possess a champion-level team and several pokemon whose evolution methods are completely unknown. Again: do not antagonize. If unsure of the outcome, do not approach.

*Note from A201, Sinnoh Police: The exact wording was, “if she wants to make new discoveries that change our understanding of pokemon as we know it, then by Arceus are we going to damn well let her. We would be idiots to try and stop it from happening. Let’s just watch her so we actually have a record of what in the Distortion World she’s doing.” To which the Agent would like to comment that HQ has volunteered themselves to process the resulting paperwork.

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Additional Notes: 

Aug. 20, 2009 Interviewer Agent A201, Sinnoh Police would like to clarify that the Solaceon Ruins archeologists (beginning with Team SR28, though it has begun to spread to other SR teams) have begun to refer to this ongoing report as the “FU report.” Additional name has been noted under title abbreviations.

Aug. 21, 2009 HQ would like to note that the abbreviation “FU” is inappropriate.

Aug. 25, 2009 Agent A201 would like HQ to note that whenever they get around to reading through the backlog of incident reports for Trainer Ferrous’s incomprehensible chaos, they are welcome to rename their case reports to something more appropriate to the situation.

Oct. 6, 2009 HQ would like to note that the title and abbreviation will remain unchanged.

Cynthia looked up to stare blankly at the poor agent in charge of delivering the report. The man shifted uncomfortably at her gaze and continued silence. Finally, she opened her mouth to speak.

“…do you think I could lure her to the Sinnoh Archeology department with ice cream?”

The agent felt a vein in his head throb. “…no, Champion. That would be in violation of the recruitment subsections of the open-border treaties with Kanto.”

“Hmm… Maybe with some rare pokemon…”

The agent closed his eyes and prayed that this Arceus-forsaken week would be over soon.

Chapter Text

The idea was first brought up by Hanna.

“We should get tickets to the Indigo Conference!” she declared, one night in the middle of spooning peas into a large dish.

Matthew paused. “Don’t we have a television, dear?”

Hanna rolled her eyes and glared at him as if he were the one making no sense. “Of course we do, but this year is special!”

“You say that every year, honey.”

“This year is extra special then, dear.” Hanna grinned slyly. “Don’t you want to see that little lady who challenged you destroy her competition in person?”

Matthew froze. Then his eyes started glinting with an unholy light.

“Honey,” he said fondly, “you always were the brains of the two of us.”

“Good.” Hanna nodded firmly, content with her husband’s praise. “Now you’re in charge of getting the village to come along with us.”

“Pardon?”

Hanna rolled her eyes. “Dear, don’t you think that girl Vicky should get more support than just us?” She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye, immediately forestalling any protests. “Matthew, you cannot seriously think they wouldn’t be interested in the girl? It’s all the kids have been talking about for weeks. And don’t think I didn’t notice you and your group of old men trying to keep track of the news just to try and get a glimpse of the girl.”

Matthew rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly.

Hanna scoffed. “Well then, at least you know where to start.” She turned back to the peas and the soup, grabbing a ladle. Her face slowly split into an evil grin. “I’ll get the neighbors involved.”

“That sounds like an excellent plan, honey.” Matthew’s eyes shone brighter with barely contained excitement. 

“Now go on, spread the news.” She waved him off with the ladle. “We’ll need to work fast or else there won’t be enough tickets.”

“Yes, dear.” With a sigh and a creaking groan, Matthew picked himself up from his chair and went to grab his coat.

“Oh, dear?” His lovely wife called from inside the house. “Do drop by Maddy’s house to let her know, and Midori, I am sure the two of them would love to tag along!”

A shiver crawled down Matthew’s spine at the mention of the creepy ladies who somehow were his lovely wife Hanna’s best friends. Matthew could swear they were talking about the best ways to throw a knife into vulnerable targets the other day. He shivered again.

“Yes, dear,” he capitulated. 

Brad liked his job.

Being a League security officer might not have been all it cracked up to be, but the pay was good, and even better, he didn’t have to spend a fortune on Indigo Conference tickets to watch it live—staff discounts were real, and they were the stuff of gods.

That was the main reason he stayed for the frankly boring job, though his friend—Larry, who was busy yawning his way through another round of one of his mobile games—was another reason. Brad barely managed to stifle his own yawn.

Being a League security officer was great and all, but it was either complete anarchy and chaos when the conference actually began, or soul-sucking boredom in the days leading up to it.

Three guesses as to which one it was now. And the first two didn’t count.

There was a rumbling in the distance. Larry perked up, carefully saving his game and sliding the phone into his pocket. Brad eagerly craned his neck to see what Birds-sent benefactor had come to relieve them of their utter boredom. And what graced his eyes was…

… a whole bunch of old people.

Really? Brad sighed to himself. Then he did a double-take. Sure, they were retirees…

But the pokemon they were riding on, they were trained, and trained well. Brad could see countless battle scars and sculpted muscles; even despite looking like they had taken a long, well-deserved break from battling, their physique from their golden glory days shone through, a sharp and imposing aura that clashed terribly with the advanced age of their riders. The procession came to a gradual stop as they reached the gates of the Indigo Arena. 

Several children gleefully slid off of large nidorinos, sprinting and tackling each other to the ground. The adults followed at a sedate pace, swinging themselves off of their pokemon. A charizard roared at the back of the crowd, and Brad tensed.

Brad raised a hand to intercept them, but before he could get barely a word out Larry gasped and slapped it away.

Brad startled and glared. “What the heck, man, we need to do our job, even if it’s a bunch of retirees—”

“Do you not recognize them?” Larry asked faintly.

“…should I?” Brad asked, confused with growing worry at his friend’s state.

“You idiot!” Larry hissed, “that’s the third place winner from 20 years ago! My grandma made me watch the finals on TV over and over again—he has a venusaur! And that over there—” He pointed to an elderly woman, finger shaking, “—she’s the 4th place winner from 25 years ago. Look at that Charizard!”

“Calm down buddy, you’re about to hyperventilate—”

“No, listen, Brad! I think I see 5 more who got in the top 16 a while back – my grandma always told stories about it, there’s merch of them! Granted, not too much, since it was a long time ago, but…” Larry devolved into frantic muttering. Brad could do nothing but pat his back gently, waiting for his friend to ride out the star-struck panic. 

“It’s always nice to see youngsters recognizing their elders!” A worn, laugh-lined voice rang out from beside them. As if summoned, an old man ambled over, an enormous, battle-scarred nidoking lumbering behind him. He was grinning widely, joyful wrinkles around his face belying the sheer vitality and excitement in his eyes. The looming pokemon behind him fixed them with a dismissive gaze. Brad pushed down the instinctive urge to step back, feeling his hand shake. Larry beside him was no better, trembling in awe.

“Can I ask what you’re doing here, sir?” Brad asked respectfully.

“Why, supporting a good friend of ours, of course!” He chuckled. “She gave my nidoking here a fantastic battle. Good sprout, that lass.”

Larry gulped. “She fought that?” he muttered, aghast.

The old man chuckled again, louder and more deeply, an undercurrent of exhilaration and sharp, vicious joy. “She defeated him. This old buddy of mine could barely stand! Thrashed him well and good, I’ll say.”

The nidoking grunted and shoved the old man’s shoulder, more in disgruntlement than any offense. The old man just smiled fondly at his partner.

“I should get back to helping unload, or Hanna will have my hide,” the man said with a dry smile, “keep up the good work, lads.” He patted them on the shoulder. It felt more like a punch, and Barry wheezed.

Barry nodded, straightening up. “Will do, sir.” Larry chimed his breathless agreement.

“And keep an eye out for that lass Vicky!” The old man called as he walked away with a spring in his step, his nidoking following faithfully like an overgrown shadow. “She’ll be going places.”

In the distance, the guards could see the Pallet Town natives returning their pokemon and unpacking old, worn tents, camping chairs. A fire pit suddenly sprang to life in the center, and they could see the flickering fire from other circles. And all around, they could see banners being unfurled, signs resting on tent poles, and cheerful flags proclaiming support for “Vicky.”

“Hey, Larry…” Brad hesitantly began.

“… Yeah?”

“If these guys are monsters in the battling scene…”

“Yeah, I don’t think any of them got under 7 badges,” Larry whispered, “out of everyone here.”

Brad uncharacteristically hesitated. “…And the whole village came along?”

Together, they looked at the masse of humans and pokemon, bulging muscles and more battle scars than they could count. The crowd of simple villagers was somehow more intimidating and sharp than any others they’ve seen. Tourists and audience-goers skirted around the edge of the Pallet Town mob, taking brief glances before quickly looking away. Even some of the battlers in the tournament looked furtively at the enormous nidoking, charizard and scattered pikachu and growlithe frolicking around.

Larry nodded. “All the old battlers, looks like it.” His voice was quiet with suppressed awe.

Brad gulped. “Then what exactly does that say about that girl they’re supporting?”

The crowd had grown, until it now resembled an entire town of tents and campfires, the whole of which had sprung up around the Indigo Arena in the last 10 minutes alone. The low murmurs of conversation and sporadic cheering floated into the air, punctuated by the high giggles of playing children and the quiet but no less excited laughter of the men and women around the fires. In the lulls of conversation, Brad could just barely hear one name repeated over and over: Vicky. Larry and Brad continued to stare in silence at the rapidly expanding fireside picnic in front of them.

Larry glanced at Brad out of the corner of his eye. “You up for a round about the stands when we get off work? We can see if there are recordings of her fights,” he offered.

“ Yes,” Brad immediately agreed, “I’ll get the drinks. You get the popcorn.”

“Deal.”

An explosion of cheers from the stands had Vicky whipping her head around to look as she entered the large arena. Her eyes immediately caught on a large, colorful section of the closer seats, who only hollered louder as she turned to look at them. She could see Matthew and Hanna proudly waving a sign that read, “TRASH ‘EM VICKY!” with a large, lopsided drawing of a nidoking vs an arcanine at the bottom. Two rows over, Midori held a smaller colorful flag and was commenting animatedly towards another woman, who Vicky had been briefly introduced to that day on the beach and who had been an aspiring coordinator in her youth, but had now retired as a breeder. To Midori’s left, Maddy caught her eye and gave her an approving nod.

“Nin-nin,” Vicky whispered giddily.

Evil badass grannies were awesome, and her opponents were going down.

Pallet Town was the best.

Chapter Text

Everyone knew Legendaries were not nice.

They were, in fact, gods-damned terrifying.

They may not be forces of pure nature made flesh, as some of the myths and more superstitious folk in the countryside seemed to believe—Lance had seen Ho-Oh exactly once, flying far in the distance, and He was awe-inspiring, in the beauty-as-terror terminology, but certainly had a physical and (blasphemously) mortal form—but they sure as Distortion were at the very least representatives and guardians of said forces of nature, which made them pretty damn-near gods in their own right—again, Lance had seen Ho-Oh exactly once, flying far in the distance.

He had then nearly stumbled on his feet, dizzy from the sheer aura the Bird exuded, the illusionary heat of His scorching flames from making him paradoxically on the brink of feeling his own skin peel from burning yet never more alive. It wouldn’t have killed him, he was too far away for any attacks—just made him feel like he was dying.

Resurrection, Ho-Oh’s domain, was funny like that; both death and life, awful and awe-full terror.

Never again.

Thus, in a world where Pokemon were feared, loved, worked around and sometimes rarely with, it made sense that Legends were still considered myths in some parts of the regions, more inhuman, uncaring force-of-nature than living breathing creatures despite their standing as sentient Pokemon. Lance didn’t particularly see the need to disagree; it wasn’t like he could go up and ask Lord Ho-Oh or Lord Zapdos what their preferred pronouns, title of reference, and philosophy on immortalization through varied mythos was. He was more likely to die trying than to actually get a response—that was, if he didn’t die immediately upon approach, or die trying to get to wherever the Legends sequestered themselves, or heck, even died for wondering about these questions due to the excessive paranoia of some superstitious gardner with a well-sharpened pitchfork. And then Kan-Joh would be out on a Champion, and probably erupt into another war or something, even if the League didn’t immediately sweep in to exploit the living hell out of the chaos.

Ho-Oh-be-damned vultures.

Speaking of birds…

Lance looked up at the glowing, flame-molten beak of Lord Moltres, He Who Commands the Volcanoes, perched on a slowly liquefying part of the crumbled arena wall as magma oozed its way through the cracks and down the bleachers to the chorus of hysterical screams of the audience, and prepared to die.

In all honesty, it had been going great up until that point.

Victoria Ferrous was a brat of a girl with more enthusiasm than sense, and an unfailing ability to get on every one of his nerves—for Ho-Oh’s sake, she had accused him of being a flying type trainer, of all things, if that didn’t scream for retribution in the form of a severely one-sided beatdown from his dragons, Lance wasn’t sure what did. Unfortunately, she was also quite a skilled trainer. Fortunately, Lance enjoyed a good fight almost as much as a well-deserved one-sided sweep.

And what a fight it had been so far! His altaria had been taken down by a vicious direct hit from her arcanine, who had fallen to his aerodactyl, who had in turn been fainted by her goodra, who had proceeded to also take down his charizard, before falling in turn to his gyarados in an intense back and forth volley of attacks and tense, rapid-fire exchanges of blows. Her dragonite had been exhausted from its battle against his gyarados, but put up an intense fight against his own dragonite—had it been at peak condition, and not tired from an earlier fight, Lance honestly wasn’t sure which of the two would have won.

And wasn’t that alarming?

And then, right as Vicky released her fourth pokemon—an odd, doll-like creature that looked a great deal like a hand-sewn plush of an eevee with uncanny blank eyes—and commanded it to tank the oncoming Dragon Rage from his dragonite…

Screams erupted in the stadium and a rolling wave of heat slammed into the arena.

And then Lance, along with everyone else, heard the unmistakable cry:

“Moltres!”

The chaos intensified as people scrambled to run, desperately clawing their way to escape as the looming figure of the Legendary Flame Pokemon descended upon Indigo Arena. 

Here was the thing about Legendary Moltres, the Flame Pokemon, He Who Commands the Volcano.

The flame that was always lit at the beginning of the Conference? It might truly have been related to Moltres himself—might even have been sourced directly from the pokemon. It was a staple of the Indigo Conference, of their dedication to their legendaries, their culture, and the peace between the regions. It was benign for a flame, especially one of rumored Legendary prominence, and it was beautiful.

Moltres himself?

Well.

There was a reason it was a dumb idea to build a town around an active volcano.

Screams intermingled with the screeches of the bird and the creaking groans of bubbling concrete not meant to withstand the approaching heat.

They needed to evacuate, now.

Lance immediately released his remaining pokemon. All but Salamence and Dragonite had fainted in the preceding match against Vicky, a testament to her astounding skill, that in one year alone she had managed to defeat four of his pokemon with only three of hers—but he really wasn’t feeling particularly charitable at the moment. He also would really rather have preferred her to have been an easy target, because that would at least mean that he could face gods-damned Lord Moltres with more than two gods-damned pokemon.

For Ho-Oh’s sake.

They were all going to die.

“Salamence!” He called, slashing his arm widely towards the stands, cape flapping in the winds caused by the heat-convection, “protect the arena! Get people out of there!”

Salamence roared in assent and took off in flight, dodging falling chunks of charred concrete, embers, and debris. Thankfully, it seemed no one had been irreparably injured from the initial approach. He could only hope that lasted.

Victoria Ferrous had her Mimikyu out, snatching falling rock and batting plastic out of the air with its long, shadowy tendrils. The costume head snapped back and forth, a horrific cracking noise beating in rhythm with its actions as it firmly protected the spectators. Lance was undeniably unsettled by the small doll pokemon, particularly after it had withstood a hit from his dragonite with unnerving ease, but he couldn’t deny being very happy it was on his side at the moment. The stands were almost halfway empty—Indigo Arena was designed specifically for large-scale mass-movement of people—It should at least be able to cover the weaknesses of his team, and buy them enough time to finish evacuating the stadium.

Not that it would do much against a Legendary.

As if reading his thoughts, Moltres let out a piercing shriek.

The arena suddenly became unbearably hot, steam rising from the liquefying rock as the magma’s consistency turned from gooey molasses to dripping butter. Lance gasped for breath. It felt like being roasted alive from the inside of an oven.

Beside him, Victoria Ferrous was also experiencing difficulty breathing from the heat.

“It’s like Blaine’s volcano all over again,” she panted.

“Lord Moltres is the Legendary of damn volcanoes,” Lance snapped, more vitriolic than intended due to mounting hysteria.

He grabbed the arm of his dragonite, quickly hoisting himself on, and instinctively turned back to face Vicky. As much as the girl pissed him off—”flying type trainer” his ass —he was not going to let her die —

“Let’s go, my Blue Heart!” Vicky shouted, and with a practiced flick of her wrist a beautiful light blue gyarados materialized in the heat-haze. This gyarados looked a little on the small end of the spectrum, but Lance knew better than to judge—he had seen the creature decimate his opponents even with type-disadvantage. He was the absolute peak specimen of his species, and his roar as he landed on the burning ground shook several falling pieces of debris loose from the arena walls.

Victoria Ferrous, for some idiotic reason, quickly swung herself atop him.

“You idiot!” Lance hissed, “the floor is literally lava! Just grab my hand, you need to get off the ground—”

Vicky Ferrous gave him a solemn nod, but then did something that made Lance want to tear out his hair.

In future recollections of the events of Lord Moltres’s Descent at Indigo Arena, Lance would always pinpoint this as the precise moment where things stopped making gods-damned sense.

Vicky turned back to Gyarados, and gave a single order:

 “Come on, buddy, let’s Fly!”

“… What.”

He watched in absolute shock as the gyarados launched itself off of the ground and immediately hovered, a whooping Vicky astride its neck, snaking around the arena and dodging blasts of fire and falling debris. 

As if to remind them that he was still there, Lord Moltres screeched , soundblast echoing across the stadium and immediately fracturing the stands, impacting like a meteor. The rocks themselves slowly liquefied, running down the sides of the walls like honey.

Lance spared a fleeting thought that at least the audience made it out, as he caught a glimpse of his loyal Salamence grabbing the last stragglers and flying them out of the burning arena.

Then he watched in slow motion as Moltres turned to look at Salamence, but he could no nothing, helplessly opening his mouth to scream a warning—

His head snapped to the side as a blast of pink energy hit Lord Moltres square in the face.

“What the f—”

The pink energy dissipated. It looked like it did nothing more than tickle the Bird, having been warped away by the heat distortion in the air—but it had certainly distracted him. In the corner of his eye, Lance could see Salamence rushing away from the arena, final civilians in his grasp, before disappearing behind the crumbling walls.

Lance let out a breath. Everyone was safe.

“Alright!” An absurdly cheerful, young voice came from his right. “Mimikyu, you’re amazing! R—” 

Moltres blasted a flaming shot of magma, roiling like the eruption of a volcano, enormous, unavoidable, endless—

“—eturn!”

The torrential fire blast just barely missed as the beam of light returned the small doll with seconds to spare. Astride her flying gyarados— flying gyarados, Ho-Oh save us all —Victoria Ferrous grinned wildly, her expression half panic and half adrenaline-fueled exhilaration, as she clipped the closed pokeball to her belt.

Lance wanted to smack her in the face.

She’s a child, Lance. That’s bad for PR.

He was this damn close to not giving a shit.

He watched as Vicky’s hand drifted thoughtfully towards her sixth pokeball, the one Lance had never seen used in the entire contest. He had heard that she left her Milotic and Dragonite behind with her clan after hearing that her Dragonite had gotten pregnant—and wasn’t that just a lovely middle finger to the Blackthorn Clan—replacing them with Goodra, Mimikyu, and an unknown sixth.

That sixth must be powerful, if she’s using it as a trump card…

But either way, what she was doing was stupid. Was she insane??

“You can’t be serious!” Lance yelled at her, “are you crazy? That’s Legendary Lord Moltres, you can’t even think about fighting—”

Then he caught sight of Vicky’s grin.

It was absolutely unhinged.

His mouth involuntarily snapped shut. A shiver ran down his spine.

She unclipped her sixth ball from her belt. Tossed it into the air towards the being of fire and volcanoes made flesh.

“Let’s go…” –the ball sailed through the air and opened, “– Articuno! ”

An explosion of ice careened straight into Lord Moltres, slicing across his underbelly. The screech the bird let out was unholy, an ear-piercing roar of grinding stone and volcanic rumbling. An enormous bird made of ice and blizzard and snow slowly forming from the red beam of the pokeball raked her claws across his back, body hissing at the flames that shied away from her icy feathers in turn.

“…what in the Distortion—”

Victoria Ferrous, who Lance was quickly realizing was a completely new brand of unhinged, only cackled louder. “Destroy him for me, my lovely birb! Blue Heart, blast him with water!”

Her flying gyarados— flying gyarados, dear Ho-Oh what did that say about this day that that wasn’t what he was going to be having nightmares about—opened its mouth and let out a pressurized sonic blast of water. The beam slammed straight into Moltres, and though it had turned to steam halfway there and didn’t seem to do much damage to the Legendary, it still instinctively forced him to retreat a couple feet back—straight into the waiting claws of Articuno, She Who Commands the Blizzard (and apparently, Was Commanded By Gods-Damned Victoria Ferrous) who slashed at him again, scoring a long line of hissing cuts along his flank.

“Alright Blue Heart,” Vicky hollered gleefully, “let’s get started on collecting the trio! One Moltres, coming right up!” Another unhinged cackle, then a whoop: “Gotta catch ‘em all!”

Lance swore.

Vicky didn’t stop cackling wildly as she leaned into her flying gyarados and together they shot forwards towards the battle, a plume of dust and smoke and brimstone fire billowing in their wake.

Lance swore again, more colorfully.

Then he slowly tapped his dragonite to follow at a slower pace. Together, shellshocked and quite a bit rattled, champion and pokemon crested the top of the deserted, smoldering, lava-oozing stands, before drifting down to land on the untouched grass behind the stadium.

As Dragonite touched the ground, he could see several disheveled, shellshocked referees approach, followed at a distance by a large portion of the crowd—dirty, soot-covered, but mostly unharmed. The more grievously injured—the majority of which came from the initial scramble for an exit—had already been rushed to the nearby hospitals and Centers. Thankfully, there was barely enough room, given that the Indigo Arena was a popular hotspot for pokemon battles and therefore pokemon-related injuries.

There had been no casualties.

Together they stared at the ginormous fire-type legendary flying off in the distance, chased by an incensed legendary ice bird and a long, undulating rage noodle. In the pin-drop silence, he could distantly hear the offended shouts of Victoria Ferrous:

“Hey, come back here! Face us you coward! You can’t just…” The sound slowly decreased in volume before tapering out completely, as the silhouettes became mere specks in the distance.

Lance tapped the referee on the shoulder. The man startled, jumping slightly, then whipped around to face him. Lance stared at him.

“I officially forfeit.”

He dropped the Champion badge on the ground and walked away, leaving the stupefied officials to gape at his back.

Chapter Text

"This isn't one of ours." Lance answers instantly after a single glance. "She is too small to be one of our Dragonairs. She is definitely wild caught —”

Vicky gasped, and Lance tried to ignore the foreboding feeling that creeped down his spine. It resembled the feeling he got whenever Agatha was in the building.

“I recognize this!” She said with a look of realization, “you’re being a tsundere!”

Lance blinked. “Huh? No– wait—” He had no idea what that was, but he was pretty sure she had the wrong idea—

Vicky’s eyes seemed to almost physically sparkle in determination. She stood up abruptly, bowed to the assembled adults, then straightened and pumped her fist. “Bye Lance! I’m gonna make you admit to being friends!” She cheered, then rushed out of the room.

There was a moment of silence.

Then Agatha, damn her, guffawed. The loud cackling laughs echoed in the otherwise quiet room. He dropped his face into his hands, and groaned.

“How did this happen?”

Lance stared in shock at the unconscious form of his dragonite, his final, strongest pokemon. Across the arena, challenger Victoria Ferrous—now Champion Victoria Ferrous, was breathing just as roughly as he was, winded from the sheer exhilaration of the final clash. 

Lance couldn’t even be disappointed: it had been a fantastic fight, a back-and-forth clash of strength and skill that drove each of them to the peaks of their abilities as trainers. Lance… was only left with respect for this short, 14-year-old girl who had bested him at his very best in the arena. He smiled across at her, heartbeat gradually slowing as the rush of adrenaline receded. He opened his mouth to congratulate her on her wonderful achievement—

“Now you can admit that you actually want to be friends with me!”

All of his lofty respect and satisfaction destroyed in one fell swoop as Victoria Ferrous shattered the tension in the air.

“What.” Lance deadpanned after a moment of stunned silence.

Vicky beamed as if waiting for that exact question.  “I know you care a lot about image, and it’s super cool—”

“ What.”

“–but now that’s not a problem! I’ve proven that I’m just as good of a trainer as you, and my pokemon are awesome—”

Lance wanted to scream. This girl. This… moronic child was blathering about… him pretending not to be nice? After having defeated him in battle, in front of the entire stadium , televised for the entirety of Kanto—

“–so you don’t need to worry about that, you’re an awesome trainer! And a lot of people really look up to you—”

“What does that have anything to do with—”

“—so you don’t need to hide who you are!” Vicky finished with a beaming grin.

Lance, dumbfounded, could do nothing but stare.

Unfortunately, his silence somehow made the demonic girl in front of him only more determined. Or maybe she took it as confirmation. Of what? Lance had no Distortion-damned idea.

“Okay!” Vicky nodded firmly, then beamed at him. It was a wide, stupidly bright, somehow understanding smile, and Lance didn’t like it one bit.  “Don’t worry, I’ll get you to admit it at some point! You’re just really committed to the tsun act, and I can respect that!”

Already turning to the officials, who were only now descending the stage—they had apparently frozen in a moment of pure shock at Vicky’s earlier pronouncement, but quickly realized that they had a job to do—Vicky bounced towards him and grabbed his hand.

Lance numbly let himself be dragged to the stage. A cold shiver ran down his spine.

Whatever in the name of Ho-Oh Victoria Ferrous was talking about, it probably was nothing good.

Victoria Ferrous was the new Kanto Champion.

Because of course she was.

This also meant, since he had stayed on in his role as the Johto Champion, that she was now Lance’s coworker.

Because of course she was.

Lance was pretty sure the building was going to burn to the ground around him at some point in the near future from the sheer force of his despair. He was also pretty sure some of the staff were taking bets on how long he would take to strangle the brat.

Which was dumb. He had manners, thank you very much, and the pride of the Blackthorn Clan to think about. He wasn’t going to hurt a child. And if it got so bad then he could just pack up and leave for the Blackthorn Clan, if the morons of the League disrespected him that much.

Plus, he wasn’t going to lose to Ho-Oh-damned Victoria Ferrous. She would leave first, or not at all.

It’s okay, Lance, he consoled himself, she won’t be in the office that much. She’s not stopping her journey. You have a couple more years before you really have to deal with her. It’s okay, she can’t hurt you—

“How’s my favorite tsun doing today?” A horrifyingly cheerful voice broke through his inner monologue.

Lance reflexively dove out of his chair and under the desk.

“Laaaaance!” Vicky cheered, “I saw go under the table! Come on, it’s Champion bonding time! You gotta try out this new ice cream shop I found, it’ll be great!”

For the love of Ho-Oh, save me.

Lance hadn’t ever considered himself a particularly religious man, but at this point he was absolutely fine with praying for all it was worth.

Unfortunately, Ho-Oh was either ignoring him or particularly busy, because Lance could do nothing but let himself be dragged to the ice cream shop.

He dully tried a bite of his mint chip ice cream.

It was good, dammit.

He sulked lower and sighed.

“Fe-ferrous!” The cashier called out, stuttering in star-struck awe. The enormous scoop of rocky road ice cream was dripping down onto his hand, but he didn’t seem to notice. Victoria Ferrous was just as oblivious as the man himself with respect to her own fame; she bounded up to the register and joyfully grabbed the cone.

“Thanks!” she said happily. The cashier stuttered out an incomprehensible reply.

Lance rolled his eyes, and slid his card onto the counter before Vicky could reach into her pocket. The Blackthorn Clan had always taught him to take care of his juniors, and like it or not, Ho-Oh-damned Victoria Ferrous was one of them. So he would pay, because he was a Blackthorn, and as the clan’s pride he had manners, thank you very much.

The cashier’s shaking fingers slid his card through the machine and returned it, trembling with excitement. Lance ignored him and shoved the card back into his wallet, reluctantly turning to face his unfortunate companion.

He froze.

Vicky looked at him with an incomprehensibly sparkling gaze. Her eyes were wide, innocently ecstatic, and were those tears at the corner? What in Ho-Oh’s name. What. Why—

“I knew it!” Vicky squealed in joy, and— nope. Nope. Nope. He was not doing this. Ever. No way.

Lance immediately backpedaled and speed walked out of the store, desperately trying to conserve the dredges of his Blackthorn pride. He was not running. He did not flee, not from anyone and certainly not from a child. Victoria Ferrous was definitely going to let him go—

“Wait up!”

“Distortion gods-damned—” Lance swore under his breath, and desperately tried to walk faster. He was reaching the point where it was more of a light jog. Any more and he would be seen running from a child—

“Aww, thanks for letting me catch up!” The cheerful voice of she-who-was-now-his-arch-nemesis exclaimed, “being a tsundere fits you so well, I can’t believe more people don’t see it—”

“What are you talking about?” Lance threw his hands up in the air and finally slowed down to a stately walk, resigned to his fate. He wasn’t quite able to keep a slight whine from his voice, however. Mortifying. “What is a tis-oon-dair? Why are you following me? Why do you do this to me?”

“Oh!” Vicky exclaimed, “I probably should have realized you wouldn’t know, it being…” she trailed off into a series of mumbles under her breath. Something about a different world? Was Lance missing something about the new generation’s online lingo or something?

He cleared his throat, and resisted the urge to just walk faster again. He was reaching his building, maybe he could ditch her as soon as they went inside… but no, he needed to hold the door: he was a gentleman with manners, not an uncivilized country girl like a certain Champion.

Vicky started as they crossed the threshold and continued down the hallway to the Elite Four offices. “Sorry! Tsundere! Right…” she trailed off again, “how do I explain this? Well… It’s like… You have someone with a lot of pride, right?” Lance hummed. Alright, he could see that… “But on the inside they’re actually a big softie—” Lance’s head snapped around to stare at her incredulously, but she barrelled on, “–but because they have too much pride they can’t tell people how they really feel! Which is why they need people to see them for who they really are, and not who they pretend to be!” She finished triumphantly.

Lance had, at this point, stopped point-blank in the middle of the hallway, staring.

What the Distortion was coming out of this child’s mouth?

Taking his silence for affirmation—which it most emphatically was not —Vicky nodded firmly. “You just need more people to realize how cool you are!” She declared. Well, Lance wouldn’t say no to that— “I’m gonna tell my friends that you’re actually really sweet!”

Gods-dammit.

“Victoria Ferrous, by Distortion don’t you freaking dare— ”

Deaf to his protesting shouts, Victoria Ferrous bounded down the hallway. Lance stopped abruptly as the door slammed behind her.

Well, that was a good run. He’d had a good life. He’d been Champion! Of two regions! One of the youngest ever! He was doing great. He could retire happily to the countryside where no one would ever see him again—

The door swung open, revealing the silhouette of a spry older woman with a long cane, staring straight at his form as he slumped over the desk.

Agatha’s lips split into an unnerving grin.

Lance gave her his best, dead-eyed stare. “Not. A. Word.”

Agatha’s mouth opened wider, like the gaping maw of a haunter. “Oh,” she gushed, “he’s secretly embarrassed, isn’t that cu–”

Lance immediately pushed her out of his way to the office, passed through the door, and slammed it in her face. He then proceeded to desperately ignore the loud cackles coming from the other side.

Some days, he couldn’t tell who was more terrifying: Agatha, or Victoria gods-damned Ferrous.

Lance’s relationship with Claire had weirdly enough improved over the past couple weeks, despite him being increasingly prickly from stress. 

It was… nice.

Lance felt like he should maybe ask about it at some point, but honestly he wasn’t about to look a gift-ponyta in the mouth.

Eventually, Lance was forced to face the truth: Victoria Ferrous was honestly doing a lot of good for both Kanto and Johto. In the past year of her tenure as Kanto Champion, she had single-handedly revived the dying field of pokemon professors in Indigo, made several drastic scientific breakthroughs with her new teaching assistants, brought pokemon knowledge forward by at least three decades, irritated half of the Blackthorn Clan so much that they were forced to cede power in Kanto just to get away from her, laid the foundations for a robust Contest circuit, and somehow networked with half of the most influential figures since her parents were born.

It was just… incomprehensible.

Lance could do nothing but throw his hands up and surrender.

He could keep his champion position in Johto, and he could focus more on his own region’s development, balancing the traditionalist faction with the younger, modernizing wave, which he had never had enough time to truly focus on as Indigo Champion. He could also finally engage in equal diplomatic ventures to ally with Kanto, legitimizing their status and taking strides to put an end to this rivalry once and for all.

Hopefully, this would mean a lot more people could live better lives, in both of their regions.

Now if only people would stop looking at him and smiling like he was cute. He was not cute! He was the powerful pride of the Blackthorn Clan! The strongest Dragon Trainer! He didn’t care about any of these peasants!

Chapter Text

@IronVictory14 | Vicky the Gremlin

Got a great group photo! Ignore Dragonite and Milotic, they’re always like that

[Photo: Vicky is on a beach, with sand stretching off into the distance, and looming behind her is a large gyarados staring directly into the camera as she gives it a grin and a peace sign, with her trademark straw hat. In the middle-ground, an arcanine can be seen in mid-leap towards what looks like a frisbee while Chansey’s arm blurs, presumably having thrown it. In the background, the faint silhouettes of a dragonite and a milotic are curled around each other.]

Comments 931 | Likes 5.1k | Rechirps 2.3k

@BulbaBuddy_567 WHAT

— @ZubatZoomer_11 What

— @PsyduckPulse23 WhAt

— [click to see more replies]

@spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Better VICKY WHAT EVEN IS YOUR TEAM-

— @ElectricZapster Seconded

— @rhyhornrumble_44 Thirded

— @ZubatZoomer_11do you know this trainer?

— @creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy @ZubatZoomer_11 yeah she’s like that

— @ZubatZoomer_11 @creepingivy52 wtf???

@persianperfection | Cat’s Meow Excellent photo, my dear granddaughter, I see you have been improving

@persianperfection | Cat’s Meow You can do better than flannel, though. Stop by the mall in Viridian for some better outfits

— EeveeEnigma_96 That’s what you’re focusing on??

— @westpeninsulaarcaninetrainer | Arcany Dad Mother, that’s really not the focus here

@CharmanderCharm That Arcanine is truly a beautiful specimen! What food do you use, and grooming equipment? If you ever come by Palle… [click to expand]

@psyKickachu i call hax

— @meowthmelody88 no way this is real, i think SilphCo was working on image editing tech

— @jigglypuffpulse ur just jealus

— [click to see more replies]

@MarillMuse_444 Is anyone going to comment on the dragonite/milotic pairing in the background? No one?

— @wooperwhirl_888 Blackthorn clan might

— @jigglypuffpulse lol gettem

— @rhyhornrumble_44 Can dragonite and milotic even make eggs? I know there’s been some research into this, but not a lot has bee… [click to expand]

— [click to see more replies]

@JynxJive_789 Oh my Birds guys I know I’m late to the party but this is blowing up everywhere, it’s insane-

From a young age, Vicky loved to scrapbook. It was a way to paste all her favorite memories onto a page, with revolutionary camera technology created by SilphCo. She wasn’t sure why it hadn’t become something like a pokedex yet, still too young to really get a grasp on why her parents thought Professor Oak was one of her childhood imaginary friends — heck, she wasn’t exactly allowed to be connected to the internet at 6 years old, okay? Cut her some slack! But it was a way to keep memories of her favorite pokemon.

It was, in fact, the only thing that could match her boundless enthusiasm about pokemon.

Her parents might have been just a little desperate to rein in her impulses to adopt all the creatures she came across. Vicky was pretty sure that the final straw came from her dragging home a feral rattata that was actively trying to claw its way through her backpack.

Probably not the greatest idea to set a rat loose in a cat-breeding family. Gram-gram’s Persian made short work of it.

But that was most likely the inciting incident that made her parents realize that Vicky wasn’t going to stop looking for ways to get herself killed by cool animals.

So they got her a camera.

It did not exactly work as intended; Vicky was ecstatic, and promptly began taking more pictures of pokemon, and going out to take looks at them, actively exploring in areas to catch glimpses of the pokemon from afar. She printed them out and stuck them to her wall, an enormous, sprawling collage of her love for the world and the creatures in it.

Her parents almost had a heart attack when they spotted a gorgeous shot of an enraged beedrill.

Any and all groundings just made her stay out longer, or worse, hide her excursions from them; as Dad put it, “if she gets hurt, I want to know about it,” so eventually, they gave up on stopping her.

But not before getting her a camera with a very, very good zoom function: If they couldn’t keep her from taking photos of dangerous ones, they could at least make sure she’s far away while she did it.

The only real change to Vicky’s obsessive photography hobby after the Milotic incident was that her parents finally had enough money to buy her a fully waterproof camera.

Vicky was obsessed. Milotic was just gorgeous, okay? Her beautiful, loveable, wonderful fishy! He deserved all the love. 

It took a little time to get over his natural shyness, but by the end of the day, Milotic was anything but camera-shy.

Gram-gram took one look at her printed photos, which the man at the cash register simply would not stop goggling at, and decided that they might sell well.

They sold very well.

Vicky’s hobby was now another legitimate way of making enormous amounts of money for the family — and this one, Gram-gram vindictively stated, did not have to go through the Clan investments. Good riddance.

Vicky was more than happy to develop her camera skills, merging her all-consuming obsession of all things pokemon with her desire to let everyone know just how awesome they were, and help out her family. Win win!

Curiously enough, she soon found herself taking more care with her appearance. She still didn’t care about getting messy with her pokemon, and would track mud all over her clothes if need be—much to her mother and Gram-gram’s despair. But she knew at least the basics of what looked good on her, and how she could dress up nicer for when she needed it—which admittedly was very, very rarely. 

Because it was the same thinking as her training: she trained herself to show that her pokemon weren’t alone, and encouraged them to do better. If she wanted to highlight how awesome her pokemon were, then a well-dressed trainer in her photos made more of an impression than a scruffy one.

Both Gram-gram and her mother were flipping ecstatic the first time she asked them what looked good on her. Vicky thought the tears of joy were a bit much, to be honest.

Dad just breathed a sigh of relief… until she came home covered in mud again. Then he seemed to just decide that it was good enough that she at least knew how, even if she was never going to put it in practice.

She trained her pokemon incredibly well, and celebrated by documenting all of her favorite moments with photos. By the time she turned of age to start her journey, Vicky had filled multiple scrapbooks with photos, and was on her third for that year alone.

No one had any idea just how this would impact her journey in the future.

In another world, Victoria Ferrous might have also loved to scrapbook. In another world, the rural, non-clan Ferrous family might even have gotten their daughter a camera from a young age. In that other world, Victoria Ferrous could very well have gone on her merry way, training pokemon and never really thinking twice about her past hobbies, because she loved her pokemon, and wanted other people to love her pokemon, and that was really what mattered; she didn’t really feel the need to make space for a camera in her backpack anyway, with all the pokemon food she would be carrying.

In this world, two years before Victoria Ferrous embarked on her life-changing Pokemon Journey, SilphCo released PidgeyChat.

PidgeyChat was a revolutionary platform where users could chirp short messages to one another or post a longer feather on their page. The platform took the world by Thunderstorm, as the news outlets said.

Despite not yet having been released in other regions due to SilphCo’s headquarters being located in Kanto, it still rapidly conquered Kanto’s population. The platform was absolutely dominated by young people curious about various parts of the region, and even the older generations rapidly learned how useful it was to keep in touch with people, gain a following, gain cash to fund their Journey, and advertise their businesses.

Vicky did not need cash, did not care about popularity, and had her own awesome plans for her pokemon, but as an eager young teenager about to embark on her Journey, and a bit more in-tune with the trends thanks to her mother and Gram-gram’s painstaking efforts, she got an account. If only to see what all the fuss was.

Maybe she could post pictures of her goodest boy Arcanine? Or her fishy-wishy Milotic? Maybe Chansey would be interested too. They deserved to have all the love and compliments, from everyone in the world.

Of course, it all spiraled from there.

Chapter Text

@IronVictory14 | Vicky the Gremlin
Who said Chansey can’t be battlers???
[Video: Begins with Vicky (presumably behind the camera) shouting encouragement at Chansey, who is looking back towards her. In the background, a figure (multiple commenters have identified this as Koga) stands in front of a large pagoda-style house. In the middle-ground, a Golbat flies above an official League battlefield. Chansey seems to cheer, and turns around. Vicky calls out, “Show him what you’ve got!” and Chansey immediately speeds towards Golbat (multiple analyses have noted that this does not seem to be Teleport, Chansey is just moving very fast). Chansey then SUPLEXES the Golbat, knocking him out. Behind the camera, Vicky cheers, the sound distorted by how loud it is.]
Comments 1.1k | Likes 25.1k | Rechirps 17.5k

@BulbaBuddy_567 WHAT. EVEN.

— @wooperwhirl_888 WHaT

— @PsyduckPulse23 what

— @jigglypuffpulse WhAt

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@nopainnogains This is everything I’ve ever wanted

✔︎ @nursejoyofficial | Nurse Joy Glad to see your Chansey is doing so well and in quite a fine shape. Very pleased to see such a fantastic bond between trainer and pokemon.

— @JoltiXer_242 Oh my gosh nursejoyofficial

— @ThunderPichu_007 Welcome to the big leagues folks

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 Hey are you actually an army of clone sisters? I and a couple of friends have been attempting to theorize as to… [ click to expand ]

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@VoltMagnetJolt_314 Me before this video: the pink blob is cute. Me after this video: FEAR the Chansey

@AquaRush_2000 i am obsessed wtf

@EmberFlashMagmar_777 Look at those MUSCLES

@ZubatZoomer_11 Look at Koga’s FACE in the background tho

— @MarillMuse_444 It’s a thing of beauty

— @rhyhornrumble_44 I’m showing him this when I get to his gym

— @VulpixVortex_456 Screenshotted and saved for a rainy day

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@GetGainsWeightTrainingClub this is a courtesy notice to all constituents that we have a new mascot, she is this Chansey and she is God

@JynxJive_789 I’m late to the party. Again. At this point this is my entire personality

— @JynxJive_789 But like… GUYS CHANSEY APPARENTLY HAS A FANCLUB NOW???

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@IronVictory14 | I’m Coming For You Lance
Caught a wild dratini, evolved to dragonair. Now the Blackthorns are knocking at my door LOL (30 sec video of dragonair cuddles)
[Video: A dragonair slides into view, then nudges at the face behind a camera. The viewer can hear giggles. The video is titled “dragonair cuddles”.]
Comments 1.8k | Likes 20.1k | Rechirps 20.3k

@IronVictory14 | I’m Coming For You Lance I’ll show you how awesome my dragonair is, just wait Lance I’m coming for you

@spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Better Vicky what the actual f-

— @SnorlaxSiesta42 what he said

— @PikaSparklePower_22 ^

— @MagiKarpMagic99 ^

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@LeafBurstVenus_143 Who is this crazy trainer

@psyKickachu Hah liek ur scrub team could beat lance

— @jigglypuffpulse dude chill

— @meowthmelody88 I mean you can’t say he doesn’t have a point, Lance is a champion for a reason

— @MagiKarpMagic99 Yeah and she has a DRAGONITE TOO

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@BulbaBuddy_567 WHAT. Every. Single. Post. This is going to be the only thing I comment from now on.

— @PsyduckPulse23 WhAt

— @wooperwhirl_888 wHaT

— @jigglypuffpulse wWhHaAtT

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@westpeninsulaarcaninetrainer | Arcany Dad Trouble, please stop giving us heart attacks

— @rhyhornrumble_44 LOL even her nickname is “Trouble”

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@EeveeEnigma_96 Seriously, WTF

@PokeMystic_23 Those conspiracy theories are gaining more ground as we speak

@ClefairyComet_789 Anyone else want to have been a weedle on the wall during whatever prompted this post? Just me?

— @ElectricZapster this sounds hilarious, count me in

— @ZubatZoomer_11 We can make an entire swarm of espionage weedles

— @weedlewonder32 sounds like a fantastic idea to me

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@MarillMuse_444 Guys. Guys. Do you know what this means??? We actually might see a dragonite v dragonite battle!!!

— @MarillMuse_444 Normally Blackthorn gatekeeps the f- out of those things

— @rhyhornrumble_44 And for good reason, too, though that reason is pretty much just “politics”

— @meowthmelody88 Politics my dearly detested

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@IceSlashWeavile_314 Catch me sitting back and watching the chaos with popcorn

@dragondanceme does this mean if I get a dragonite I get to see Lance in person

— @VulpixVortex_456 Lol good luck

— @CharmanderCharm I wouldn’t recommend it, dear, both because getting a dragonite without going through Blackthorn channels is… [ click to expand ]

— @MarillMuse_444 Yeah, that sounds like a bad idea

@IronVictory14 | I Did This To Myself
Ninjas suck.
Comments 1.7k | Likes 20.2k | Rechirps 19.7k

@creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy Vicky??? You ok???

@ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 Ominous. No context. I like it

@SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 I don’t know whether to be proud of my homeland Kanto or scared

— @SolarFlareFlareon_111 Both. Both is good

@ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 I don’t know what’s going on but I am living the chaos this gremlin child creates

…

@creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy Vicky??? It’s been a week???

— @ZubatZoomer_11 Excuse me, on risk of sounding like BulbaBuddy WHAT

— @EeveeEnigma_96 should someone send a search party out??

— @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Better Somehow I think she’ll be fine

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@persianperfection | Cat’s Meow Do bring back a souvenir, my granddaughter! And say hello to Koga from me

@IronVictory14 | Glorious and Beautiful Kunoichi Nike, Protector of the Moon
Ninjas ROCK
Comments 1.6k | Likes 20.1k | Rechirps 19.8k

@meowthmelody88 Context???

— @MysticWarpGengar_666 ^

— @HydroVortexBlast_987 ^please

— @AeroSlashDragon_321 ^ but I don’t have high hopes, the Gremlin never explains Her thoughts

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 Glorious chaos. Followed

@IceBeamSquirtle_128 Do I want to know? I do not think I do

— @PsyWaveEevee_199 Lol my reaction every time

— @BlazinChar_1234 Welcome to the chaos, you’ll never leave

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 Thanks, I hate it here

@SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 Yep scared, definitely scared

@westpeninsulaarcaninetrainer | Arcany Dad Please come straight home, Trouble

— @rhyhornrumble_44 The Parents have spoken

— @PikAurora_151 Uh oh

— @JoltiXer_242 LOL

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@BulbaBuddy_567 WHAT

— @ZubatZoomer_11 Still at it I see

— @BulbaBuddy_567 buddy it still fits my mood

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy At this point I don’t even care, I’m just glad you’re still alive

— @westpeninsulaarcaninetrainer | Arcany Dad Thank you for looking out for our daughter, Ivy

— @creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy Someone has to

— @MarillMuse_444 True friendship, right there. Making sure they’re not dead after they do dumb sh*t

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@westpeninsulaarcaninetrainer | Arcany Dad
@IronVictory14 VICTORIA FERROUS.
GET BACK HOME RIGHT THIS INSTANT. YOU ARE GROUNDED.
Comments 1.6k | Likes 20.1k | Rechirps 19.8k

@ThunderPichu_007 primal fear

@IronVictory14 | One Fish Two Fish Red Fish- Ahahahaha I’m in trouble

— @westpeninsulaarcaninetrainer | Arcany Dad Yes.

— @jigglypuffpulse LOL

— @PikAurora_151 I’d say holler if you need an extraction but I’m not going up against a pack of growlithe even for funny celebrity gremlin

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@CharmanderCharm Oh dear

@ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 Praise the chaos

@BulbaBuddy_567 WHAT (concern)

— @ElectricZapster Glad to see you here, friend

— @ZubatZoomer_11 BulbaBuddy has spoken, all is right in the world

— @FlamewingRapid_789 the guy is a constant mood

@psyKickachu lol get rekt

@IronVictory14 | One Fish Two Fish Red Fish-
Ahahahaha so my parents somehow found out about Gyarados my beautiful blue fishy heart and now I’m grounded, see you in a couple months
Comments 1.9k | Likes 20.3k | Rechirps 21.8k

@BulbaBuddy_567 W H A T (fear)

— @PsyduckPulse23 WhAt

— @FlamewingRapid_789 you and me both, buddy, you and me both

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@AquaRush_2000 a GYARADOS???

@VoltMagnetJolt_314 Oh great. More pokemon to fear

@ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 PrAiSe ThE cHaOs

@PsyWaveEevee_199 WTF

@BlazinChar_1234 All of a sudden the new nickname makes a terrifying amount of sense

@IceBeamSquirtle_128 WHAT THE HECK

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 HOW HAS SHE NOT DIED LIKE 17 TIMES

— @rhyhornrumble_44 spite

— @EeveeEnigma_96 pure unadulterated gremlin energy

@creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy Vicky you’re #1 in trending, WTF

— @creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy and it’s because you got GROUNDED

— @meowthmelody88 icon right there

— @PikAurora_151 only Vicky

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@MarillMuse_444 This child is going to destroy the league

Chapter Text

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | One Fish Two Fish Red Fish-
Hey so apparently I got a tiny checkmark next to my name? Like, I appreciate the validation, but I’m not sure why?
Comments 1.1k | Likes 20.7k | Rechirps 22.7k

@creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy Vicky…

@spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Done Don’t look at me, I already tried to tell her

The PidgeyChat user IronVictory14 had become rather well-known in certain circles.

Those circles being, well, pretty much everyone with even a passing interest in pokemon, but more specifically, it came as quite a surprise that she was also very popular among the professors and researchers of the Kanto-Johto regions. Specifically because of her ridiculous photos.

Alone, they were overturning decades of pokemon knowledge.

IronVictory14 had an entire gallery of crisp, clear, multi-angled shots showing off the gorgeous build of her peak-shape Arcanine, a record of groundbreaking information on Gyarados behavior and habitats, and completely novel possibilities for Chansey utilization and training. Her Gyarados had somehow not flown into the rage so characteristic of his species, and was highly receptive to training. Her Milotic was rapidly becoming a pokemon idol with the number of posters of him sold, and the prism scale business had made the Ferrous Clan and Ferrous family very rich indeed. Not to mention an entire gallery record her Birds-damned Dragonite, a pokemon species that was historically jealously guarded by the Blackthorn clan with exorbitant price walls to even acquire a mere photo. Yet here was this no-name trainer from a backwater town with one-hundred and seventeen glamour shots of her Dragonite and each of its evolutionary stages.

Researchers and scientists everywhere were practically foaming at the mouth.

Thus, it shouldn’t have come as a surprise that professors and researchers from all over the region began to create PidgeyChat accounts, purely to keep track of this fascinating and ground-breaking trainer.

Really, it shouldn’t have.

✔︎ @IndigoFanReviews
HOW THE HECK ARE THERE ENTIRE RESEARCH STATIONS ON HERE NOW AND THEY’RE ALL FOLLOWING THIS ONE TRAINER
Comments 9.2k | Likes 15.1k | Rechirps 22.4k

@PikAurora_151 First time? Welcome to the Vicky madness

@creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy Oh my gosh VICKY YOU DIDN’T TELL ME YOU HAD LITERAL RESEARCHERS FOLLOWING YOU

— @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Done I don’t think she knows

— @creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy how can she not know???

— @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Done :shrug: 

@DragonTwistite_42 Me 5 mins ago: Who is this rando everyone is following— HOLY SH*T IS THAT A DRAGONITE

— @PikAurora_151 5 mins later: holy Birds is that a GYARADOS

— @JoltiXer_242 holy heck is that an Arcanine?

— @rhyhornrumble_44 At this point her entire team just makes you stop and stare individually, now imagine her followers being bombarded with group photos on her PidgeyChat page

@wooperwhirl_888 First Nurse Joy then literal research stations??

— @VoltMagnetJolt_314 Nurse Joy???

— @wooperwhirl_888 See pretty much all the posts she makes about Chansey

@FrostBlastGlalie_275 Oh my Birds I have a poster of that Milotic!

@ZubatZoomer_11 Guys, gals, nonbinary pals, we are witnessing history right here. Not sure what kind but it sure is history

— @EeveeEnigma_96 and that’s news for this trainer how?

— @ZubatZoomer_11 @EeveeEnigma_96 harsh but fair

@ElectricZapster Well friends, to those of us who have been here since the very beginning: cheers!

— @wooperwhirl_888 cheers

— @ZubatZoomer_11 Cheers!

— @rhyhornrumble_44 heck yeah

— @MysticLeafLeafeon_111 I’m new but I’m cheering for you

— @EeveeEnigma_96 Cheers!

— @ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 the chaos is real, let anarchy reign

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@AeroSlashDragon_321 Anyone see that last Vicky post about the puppy pile of growlithe and one Arcanine

— @ZapThunderZubat_555 SO FLUFFY

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 You bet the researchers have

— @PsyduckPulse23 @IceBeamSquirtle_128 lol

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@GetGainsWeightTrainingClub Praise be to the Chansey, Goddess of Gains! Join us, friends, and let us embark on a transformative journey

— @PikAurora_151 ^this is just an ad for a weight-training gym btw

— @AquaAeroSeadra_555 Is this person insane?

— @meowthmelody88 @AquaAeroSeadra_555 It’s extended exposure to Vicky, it happens sometimes

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@BulbaBuddy_567 This isn’t even one of IronVictory’s posts, but I still feel the need to say it… WHAT

— @EmberFlareon_777 Ayyy

— @AquaSurgeGyarados_8888 eyyyy

— @jigglypuffpulse WhAt

— [ Click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Walking How-(Not-)To Guide
By popular request, a how-to guide on deciphering my beautiful Blue Heart’s expressions (it’s obvious tho??)
[Video: a hand blocks the camera, adjusting the position, then is taken away. After the flare of light subsides, the viewer can see a long stretch of sandy beach next to a large ocean in the background. Vicky stands with her signature straw hat with an enormous Gyarados face next to her. She grins at the camera.
“Okay! I think that’s rolling.” She turns to Gyarados. “Hey buddy!”
She places her foot on his cheek and begins to wriggle her way up his large face. Gyarados looks undisturbed.
“So! This is his sleepy face right now. You can tell because his eyelids are halfway down and his big lips are droopy along the edges. This—” she reaches down and drags the lips back from her perch atop his head, “is his annoyed face. Also his hungry face. My baby boy gets hangry, yes you do, awww—” Vicky’s voice devolves into unintelligible mutters as she squishes Gyarados’s face, again to no reaction save for a low rumble.
She gasps in surprise. “And that’s a happy noise! Aww yes you’re my big blue heart, yes you are…”
After a couple more seconds of smushing his face and “happy noises,” she turns back to the camera. “Loud roars mean really angry, or ready for battle, which in a lot of cases might be the same thing. There are different pitches of roars though, and it’s pretty obvious how my beautiful blue heart’s lower roar is angry and higher roar is battle-ready. Honestly, why can’t people tell…?” She finishes with a mutter.
“Anyway! This is his silly face—” she squishes his cheeks together, “–and here’s his bored face—” she drags them down, “and here’s—ack!”
Gyarados cuts her off with a large, long, slimy lick. Vicky stares for a moment and then starts laughing uncontrollably.
“Ewww, oh buddy, why?” She giggles, “I’m going to have to take a shower again—”
She’s cut of by a loud, rhythmic hacking noise. Vicky gasps again. Her eyes almost seem to sparkle through the camera as she looks at Gyarados in glee.
“Oh my gosh are you laughing?” The hacking noise continues, this time with a subvocal “happy” rumble. “Oh my goodness yes! Who’s my goodest slimy fish? Huh? Who? Yes you are! My lovable danger noodle—Ack! Aaaand now I’m slimy again—”
The camera slips and falls off its stand as Vicky’s gushing continues in the background, before the video ends.]
Comments 10.2k | Likes 23.1k | Rechirps 24.5k

@ElectricZapster Well. That happened

@JoltiXer_242 “It’s obvious tho”

— @jigglypuffpulse ItS oBvIoUs ThO

— @DragonFury_Draco_56 its obvious tho

— @PikAurora_151 “It’s Obvious Though”

— @ZapThunderZubat_555 LOL

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@westkantoresearchofficial | Viridian Research Station Thank you for this fantastically informative video! We would love it if you stopped by our… [ Click to expand ]

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@westpeninsulaarcaninetrainer | Arcany Dad Just… please don’t show your mother this video. -Dad

— ✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Walking How-(Not-)To Guide :salute_emoji:

— @BlazeWingPony_789 The Parents have appeared! The Parents are surprisingly supportive!

— @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Done pretty sure the correct phrase is “just done with everything”

@BulbaBuddy_567 what

— @jigglypuffpulse whAt

— @rhyhornrumble_44 aaaand there he is folks

— @PsyduckPulse23 what

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@meowthmelody88 Birds-dammit I’m being corrupted if I found that little smile cute

@PokeMystic_23 the conspiracy boards for this are going to be WILD

@southeastkantoresearchofficial | Vermillion Research Station Our research experts are currently investigating forms of pokemon communication, and would like to interview… [ Click to expand ]

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@ZubatZoomer_11 I love how all of the research stations are swarming like angry beedrill with their nest disturbed

— @PsyWaveEevee_199 This one trainer is literally advancing pokemon science by DECADES they’re probably losing their MINDS

— @BlazinChar_1234 Can confirm, uncle is a research assistant and he has pulled like 5 allnighters. I wouldn’t be surprised if he started praying to IronVictory next

— @MysticWarpGengar_666 @BlazinChar_1234 dude is your uncle ok

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@CharmanderCharm Such a beautifully-well taken care of Gyarados! Without even mentioning his impressively even temper, the luster of those sca… [ Click to expand ]

@EmberFlashMagmar_777 Are we gonna see Chansey again at some point?

@JynxJive_789 Aaaand now the Kanto Research Stations are getting in on the action

@MarillMuse_444 Normally I’d feel the need to say something analytical but I’m still just staring at how Vicky’s hand was practically in his mouth and he just DIDN’T CARE

— @TwisterTail_42 ngl heart rate spiked the whole time

— @VoltMagnetJolt_314 don’t try this at home kids

— @AquaRush_2000 Vicky is the DEFINITION of don’t try this at home kids

@jigglypuffpulse blep

— @PsyduckPulse23 mlem

— @PsyWaveEevee_199 blep

— @BlazinChar_1234 bloop

— [ Click to see more replies ]

A brief look into the Chansey cult fanclub:

@GetGainsWeightTrainingClub Welcome to the 7th weekly meeting of GetGains Weight Training Gym

@GetGainsWeightTrainingClub Also known as the Chansey Fanclub

@AquaRush_2000 That Chansey though…

@EmberFlashMagmar_777 I KNOW

@nopainnogains She is a goddess

@BlazeWingPony_789 She is what we aspire to be

@GetGainsWeightTrainingClub Order!

@BlazeWingPony_789 Aye

@PsySprintKadabra_321 Aye

@nopainnogains aye

@EmberFlashMagmar_777 yes

@AquaRush_2000 Aye
@GetGainsWeightTrainingClub First order of business: has everyone watched the newest IronVictory video?

@EmberFlashMagmar_777 MY GOSH YES

@BlazeWingPony_789 yes

@nopainnogains ‘Twould be a crime not to

@EmberFlashMagmar_777 CHANSEY BENCH-PRESSED DRAGONITE

@AquaRush_2000 her MUSCLES

@PsySprintKadabra_321 I am in love

@BlazeWingPony_789 It was only 10 seconds but 10 seconds that changed my life

@AquaRush_2000 I am going to watch it over and over again

@GetGainsWeightTrainingClub Excellent! Now, we shall be having a longer discussion with a breakdown of Chansey’s perfect form and posture, as well as our own tips and tricks to become as fantastically fit as her. But before we get started, as usual, our motto!

@AquaRush_2000 Get those gains!

@EmberFlashMagmar_777 get those gains

@BlazeWingPony_789 Get Gains!

@nopainnogains Get Those Gains!

@GetGainsWeightTrainingClub Excellent! Now onto the discussion

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Oops
I think I broke a volcano
Comments 11.2k | Likes 23.4k | Rechirps 22.4k

Chapter Text

@ElectricZapster Soooo… are we gonna talk about Vicky apparently breaking a volcano?

@ZubatZoomer_11 Nope

@rhyhornrumble_44 no

@PokeMystic_23 probably

@PsyduckPulse23 nu

@BulbaBuddy_567 NO

@ElectricZapster fair enough

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | My Love Language Is Dangerous Field Trips
I’m headed into the wild! It’ll be fun, will keep posting. Love you mom, dad, Gram-gram, Arcany, Milotic flock, and mayyyybe Persian on a good day
Comments 14.7k | Likes 19.9k | Rechirps 14.2k

@BulbaBuddy_567 …what (resigned)

— @ZubatZoomer_11 I can’t tell if it’s hilarious or terrifying that I can now tell BulbaBuddy’s tone just from the word, even without the modifier

— @PsyduckPulse23 he’s an icon

— @jigglypuffpulse WhAt

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@LeafBurstVenus_143 … she’s going to die

— @rhyhornrumble_44 Hope for the best, plan for the worst

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 either Vicky dies or she turns the entire world on its head. Again.

— @ZubatZoomer_11 @IceBeamSquirtle_128 honestly with her track record I’m going for the latter

— @JoltiXer_242 dude she’s literally unkillable, her gyarados ate her and she came out fine

— @SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 @JoltiXer_242 wait when was this

— @JoltiXer_242 @SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 “Gyarados hugs” 20 sec vid 2 weeks ago

— @SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 wtf ok she’s unkillable

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 spread the chaos

@VoltMagnetJolt_314 Oh my gosh I can’t wait to see the new pokemon

— @PsyduckPulse23 yes let’s focus on that

— @AquaRush_2000 Oh my Birds same!

— @FlamewingRapid_789 I want to see a cool fire type!

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@PikAurora_151 LOL imagine if she captures a gloom, scientists be like ANOTHER ONE

@SolarShockFlare_888 Yess get a ground type

— @MysticWarpGengar_666 nah ghost is better

— @EeveeEnigma_96 how about ice since she’s said she wants to fight Lance?

— @psyKickachu hah liek she cn beat lance

— @AeroSlashDragon_321 DRAGON TYPES FOR THE WIN

— @ThunderPichu_007 ur all idiots

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@AquaAeroSeadra_555 SEADRA SEADRA SEADRA

@AquaSurgeGyarados_8888 Where’s she going??

— @MoonFrostJynx_456 “wilds”

— @AquaSurgeGyarados_8888 ye but where

— @MoonFrostJynx_456 lol idk

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@ZapThunderZubat_555 Oh my Birds imagine if she brings back a new dragon

— @rhyhornrumble_44 oof RIP Blackthorn

@MarillMuse_444 To everyone asking where Vicky is going: the exact location is under a confidentiality agreement (since she’s a minor) so any and all hints we’d have to find through PidgeyChat

— @MarillMuse_444 And judging from Vicky’s track record of shitposts, that’s going to be like teaching a Golduck to read: impossible and likely to end in severe headaches

— @wooperwhirl_888 Challenge accepted. *ties bandanna*

— @ThunderPichu_007 stupid league 

— @meowthmelody88 I get it but I don’t have to like it

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@ZapTailPikachu_143 Wait u can journey outside the region??

— @MysticMirrorEspeon_007 yeah, only for trainers with a large amt of badges tho

— @FrostBlastGlalie_275 only for acknowledged trainers

— @EeveeEnigma_96 It’s a pain in the butt and you need league certification, lots of paperwork

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 only good trainers: shows that IronVictory is really really good, or really really lucky

— [ Click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Vicky the Exploradora
My favorite compilation of fails
[Video: immediate pop music starts blaring, over a roll of tiny Solarbeams firing on a field of grass. A trainer (identified by commenters as Ivy, or @creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy) sprints into and out of the frame, followed by a swarm of fomantis. An immediate cut of the video shows the same trainer sprinting in the other direction into and out of the frame, followed by the same swarm of fomantis. In the background, the viewer can faintly see the form of a Venusaur observing the scene, and Ivy shrieking “Vicky! Help me! Vickyyyy! Come on!” set perfectly to the beat of the music.]
Comments 13.6k | Likes 20.1k | Rechirps 16.2k

@JoltiXer_242 This is one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy I don’t know how, I don’t know when, but I am going to get you for this. When did you even find the time to edit this??? We are LITERALLY IN A CAVE

— @BlazinChar_1234 watch out Vicky

— @meowthmelody88 oh boy oh boy

— @HydroVortexBlast_987 where the heck even are you guys

— @rhyhornrumble_44 LOL

— @DragonFury_Draco_56 CAVE???

— @TwisterTail_42 fear the grass trainer

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@FlamewingRapid_789 LOL grass trainer running from solarbeams

@BlazinChar_1234 This is why fire is best

— @AeroSlashDragon_321 nah dragon is best

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@AquaRush_2000 Woah those are some cool pokemon!

@wooperwhirl_888 Are those mini Solarbeams? How fast can they even fire those? Does the strength affect the energy/charge used? I don’t think I’ve seen Solarbeams rapid-fired like that before

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 huh I didn’t notice that, was too busy laughing

— @PikAurora_151 That’s actually a fun question! Any researchers in chirps?

— @EeveeEnigma_96 @PikAurora_151 Probably

— @MarillMuse_444 This would make for a pretty cool research question. Could you theoretically use a move with a stronger charge like, say, Hyperbeam, on a smaller char… [Click to expand]

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@southeastkantoresearchofficial | Vermillion Research Station Hello! We at the Vermillion Research Station would love to partner with you for an official… [Click to expand]

— @westpeninsulaarcaninetrainer | Arcany Dad Hello! Please send requests for sponsorships, partnerships, and anything else directly to us.

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@ZubatZoomer_11 What a beautiful way to start the morning

@PsyduckPulse23 LOL

@LeafBurstVenus_143 Where is this again?

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 idk

— @FrostBlastGlalie_275 no one knows

— @ThunderQuakeOnix_007 new region

— [ Click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Vicky the Exploradora
Hi guys, it’s Ivy/Grass Supremacy (trainer from the last video, @creepingivy52), Vicky gave me her phone to post stuff, here’s a pic
[Photo: through the dim light, the viewer can faintly see the stone walls of a cave, flickering in firelight. Against the far wall, an enormous mound of fluff is curled around a human girl with a large straw hat and a smaller, humanoid pokemon. Vicky, Arcanine, and the pokemon (commenters have identified this pokemon as Riolu) seem to be sleeping, or at least pretending to. To their right, a large pink blob recognizable as Chansey stares intently at the three of them.]
Comments 14.7k | Likes 19.9k | Rechirps 14.2k

@IceBeamSquirtle_128 Hey it’s the fomantis girl!

— @BlazinChar_1234 imagine being known for being a meme

— @MysticWarpGengar_666 dude have you seen IronVictory’s entire fanbase

@SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 How are you still alive

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 blink twice if you need an extraction

@ZapThunderZubat_555 FLUFF

@VortexVineVileplume_275 Aww cuuute

@wooperwhirl_888 Ok this is fantastic and all but is anyone concerned by the fact that they’re apparently living in a cave right now

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Vicky the Exploradora: Wow there are a LOT of you ~still Ivy

— @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Better And somehow Vicky still doesn’t notice

— ✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Vicky the Exploradora wait seriously? ~still Ivy

— @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Better yeah I’ve tried to tell her SO MANY TIMES

— ✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Vicky the Exploradora hang on a minute ~still Ivy

“Vicky?” Ivy called out. Her voice echoed in the cave, carrying over the slow pouring rain.

“Huh?” Vicky answered. She groaned and sniffled a bit, shifting against Arcanine, and blearily blinked at Chansey, who was staring daggers into her soul.

“Do you know you’re famous online? Like, region-wide famous,” Ivy deadpanned.

Vicky snorted as best she could with a stuffy nose and warily shifted back from Chansey. “Yeah, people get excited about pokemon. A couple researchers contacted me a while back but I told them to go to my parents. Nothing else has happened really.” She coughed again. “Haven’t checked how many followers I have but it can’t be too many? It’s not like I’m posting anything people haven’t seen before.”

Ivy stared at her.

— ✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Vicky the Exploradora holy Birds you’re right ~still Ivy

— @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Better I KNOW

— @BlazeWingPony_789 having the time of my life just watching this trainwreck of a convo 

— @EeveeEnigma_96 Makes it funnier that she’s posting all this on Vicky’s account and we all know Vicky’s STILL not going to notice

— [ Click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Vicky the Badass
I KICKED HIS BUTT
[Video: the camera slowly focuses on an idyllic forest scene, a river bumbling gently through the woods… and immediately before anything can be seen a vaguely humanlike shape blurs out of the right side of the screen, screaming, and splashes into the river, followed by a distinctly Pokemon-shape with her leg extended in a kick.
“Riiiii!” The pokemon shouts. The trainer—easily identified as Vicky, even without her large straw hat—yelps and dives down under the water. The pokemon crashes into the surface with a large splash. A moment passes.
“VICKY USES GERMAN SUPLEX!” Vicky shouts, and hurls herself out of the water, careening into the small Riolu and flipping him over her head, nearly flipping herself in the process.
A small “Riiii” scream can faintly be heard before the an enormous SPLASH resounds, and a wave nearly as tall as the camera sprays out of the water.
After a few seconds, Vicky stumbles to her feet out of the water and visibly takes a breath.
Then immediately whoops. "IT'S SUPER EFFECTIVE!" she cheers, pumping her fists in the air.
Behind the camera, the viewer can faintly hear a muttered, “for the Birds’ sake…” as the camera shakes and the video ends]
Comments 16.1k | Likes 20.5k | Rechirps 16.2k

@SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 How is she not dead. No seriously. HOW

@creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy YOU MADE ME RECORD THAT AND I AM STILL TERRIFIED

— @creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy and you got a COLD

— @jigglypuffpulse Fs in chirps

— @rhyhornrumble_44 f

— MoonFrostJynx_456 F

— @FlamewingRapid_789 f f f

— @PsyduckPulse23 moment of silence for creepingivy

— @JynxJive_789 f

— @PikAurora_151 RIP

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@JoltiXer_242 Ok THIS is the best thing I’ve ever witnessed

@ThunderBoltRaichu_2000 I can’t tell whether to bow down in worship or run away screaming

— @MysticWarpGengar_666 both. Both is good

@ElectricZapster You know, I’ve been following Vicky for a while. A lot of us have. We’ve seen some sh*t. It’s like a rite of passage, you log into the page, and oh in the past 24 hours this random trainer has just either a) redefined the laws of physics or b) reworked pokemon theory as we know it. NOW WILL SOMEONE PLEASE TELL ME WHAT IN THE BIRDS-DAMNED DISTORTION JUST HAPPENED

— @meowthmelody88 ^

— @BulbaBuddy_567 ^

— @rhyhornrumble_44 Fs in chirps

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@westpeninsulaarcaninetrainer | Arcany Dad VICTORIA FERROUS AS SOON AS YOU GET HOME YOU ARE GROUNDED FOR LIFE 

— @AquaRush_2000 ooooh trouble

— @ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 The Reckoning Approaches

— ✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Vicky the Badass Oh shoot I forgot you’re on here

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 HAHAHA

— @EeveeEnigma_96 LOL HAhah

— @FlamewingRapid_789 hahahaha

— @VoltMagnetJolt_314 immediate regret lol

— @EmberFlashMagmar_777 how did she FORGET

— @AquaRush_2000 @EmberFlashMagmar_777 it’s Vicky we don’t question

— @TwisterTail_42 HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@BulbaBuddy_567 W H A T

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@MarillMuse_444 Guys. I looked that up. That’s a Riolu… and they’re fighting type

— @BulbaBuddy_567 WHAT

@ZapThunderZubat_555 She literally beat up a fighting type wtf

— @AquaRush_2000 did Chansey teach her that

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 nah remember SHE taught CHANSEY

@ThunderQuakeOnix_007 Wtf

— @EmberFlashMagmar_777 too true

— @AquaSurgeGyarados_8888 me too my man

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@BlazeWingPony_789 SUPLEX WOOOO

@MoonFrostJynx_456 does she teach classes

— @MysticLeafLeafeon_111 in which part????

— @VortexVineVileplume_275 Man I wish

— @PsyduckPulse23 only in how to gradually descend into insanity. And then it’s not really teaching so much as hands-on experience

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@DragonFury_Draco_56 I am losing my SH*T

@PokeMystic_23 Either she doesn’t know what she’s doing, which is terrifying, or she knows exactly what she’s doing, which is terrifying

— @PokeMystic_23 I honestly don’t want to know which one is true, it’ll give me nightmares either way

— @ZapTailPikachu_143 nah she knows what she’s doing

— @MysticMirrorEspeon_007 Perfectly said

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 relatable

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@VoltMagnetJolt_314 What the actual heck

@ElectricZapster I feel like we need a dedicated place to scream

— @BulbaBuddy_567 YOU THINK??

— @rhyhornrumble_44 yes.

— @CharmanderCharm I would love to be a part of this!

— @ElectricZapster Ok I’m making a fanpage, @BulbaBuddy_567 @rhyhornrumble_44 @ZubatZoomer_11 @CharmanderCharm @MarillMuse_444 I’m adding you to mods, msg me if anyone else wants it

— [ Click to see more replies ]

Chapter Text

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | 50-Goomy Vicky
Goomy goom
[Video: Vicky sits on the forest floor, trees towering above her, filtering in midday light. Arrayed all around the clearing are small blobs of what looks like slime, only with eyes and wriggling about. As the viewer watches, Vicky reaches out with both hands and grabs the nearest slime, stretching it out and pushing it back together. Small noises come out of the ball of slime and Vicky giggles. She moves it from one hand to another. More slime balls inch towards her, nudging at her shoes. Some curious sludges near her hat, which is sitting on the ground next to her. One particularly enterprising slime leaps onto Vicky’s elbow and jiggles there. The video ends with Vicky mid-laugh.]
Comments 13.9k | Likes 18.8k | Rechirps 14.3k

@MoonFrostJynx_456 Why is it… kinda cute?

— @EeveeEnigma_96 I have no idea why but yeah it is. In a weird, slimy way

@TwisterTail_42 where can I get one?

@jigglypuffpulse blep

— @BlazinChar_1234 bloop

— @PsyWaveEevee_199 blop

— @PsyduckPulse23 blub

— [ click to see more replies ]

@SolarShockFlare_888 looks FUN

@SlashWeavile_34 Eewww

@VoltMagnetJolt_314 Friendly PSA: do NOT go out and do this at home, pokemon can be dangerous and some might be hazardous to the touch — especially if they are Poison-typ… [Click to expand]

— @meowthmelody88 thank you for the psa, good reminder

— @ZapTailPikachu_143 I mean, some poison types are fine

— @MysticMirrorEspeon_007 awww

— @HydroVortexBlast_987 party pooper

— [ click to see more replies ]

@IceBeamSquirtle_128 Ok, but what type is it??

— @EmberFlareon_777 poison? Looks like it

— @wooperwhirl_888 maybe water? Or grass? It looks like the ones in the background are munching on leaves

— @VortexVineVileplume_275 I’m guessing water/poison

— @MarillMuse_444 My guess would be Water with a secondary typing most likely, maybe Poison? Poison I’m hesitant about, because as we can see, they are not dangerous to the touch. Grass is a tempting alternative; as another commenter mentioned, we can see them munch… [Click to expand]

— [ click to see more replies ]

@BulbaBuddy_567 whaaaat awwww

— @meowthmelody88 yep kinda cute

— @rhyhornrumble_44 squish

— [ click to see more replies ]

@AeroSlashDragon_321 LOL imagine if this turns out to be some super powerful pokemon

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 I release… the Slime! *terrified gasps*

— @BlazinChar_1234 lol

— @MysticWarpGengar_666 I mean, with Vicky’s track record…

— @ZapThunderZubat_555 no way

— [ click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | 50-Goomy Vicky
Found 2 new friends! Finally got them to pose for a picture, one’s super shy and the other is super energetic!
[Photo: Vicky stands close to the camera, arm extended for a selfie, with a peace sign and her characteristic straw hat, though the hat itself seems rather battered. Attached to her forearm by its teeth and crunching down on what looks like a thick, armored arm-guard is a ferocious gible, eyes glaring straight at her trainer and promising violence. In the background, inky tendrils escape from what looks to be a small pikachu doll staring blankly at the camera with dead button eyes, head tilted at an impossible, broken angle. The tendrils of darkness are emerging from underneath the doll, and seem to blur the forest behind them in a haze of shadow, reaching out as if to grasp Vicky herself.]
Comments 18.2k | Likes 23.4k | Rechirps 16.7k

@AquaRush_2000 Guess which one’s which

— @rhyhornrumble_44 lol

— [ click to see more replies ]

@IceBeamSquirtle_128 Ok ok ok ok that’s definitely a ghost type woooaaahhh yikes

— @meowthmelody88 y i k e s indeed

@wooperwhirl_888 Many thanks for my new nightmare

@BulbaBuddy_567 whaaaat…

— @PikAurora_151 yes indeed

— @meowthmelody88 how eloquent

— @jigglypuffpulse what

— [ click to see more replies ]

@ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 pRaIsE tHe ChAoS

@SolarFlareFlareon_111 wtf

@SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 Ok I feel vindicated in asking HOW ON EARTH IS SHE STILL ALIVE

— [ click to see more replies ]

@GengarRules_000 | Agatha E4 What a beautiful ghost-type pokemon you have there! I would love to chat with you about it whenever you return, Victoria

— @MysticLeafLeafeon_111 oh my Birds

— @AeroSlashDragon_321 IS THIS AGATHA

— @CharmanderCharm Agatha is here

— @EeveeEnigma_96 Ghost Queen herself coming out to visit

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 holy Birds holy Birds holy Birds

— @MysticWarpGengar_666 dude is this Agatha this is insane

— @JoltiXer_242 oh, hey Agatha’s here— HOLY BIRDS AGATHA’S HERE???

— [ click to see more replies ]

@PokeMystic_23 HERE WE GO GUYS MORE CONSPIRACY THEORIES LET’S GOOOO

— @PsyduckPulse23 oh boy

— here we go again

— @ZubatZoomer_11 I love this and I have my popcorn ready

— @rhyhornrumble_44 go mystic go

— [ click to see more replies ]

@creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy
I don’t know where she keeps finding these pokemon but at this point I’ve given up ever trying to make sense of her
Comments 14.6k | Likes 20k | Rechirps 16.6k

@creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy: Or getting her to have self-preservation skills

@creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy
This is what I deal with
[Video: begins with a scene of Vicky sitting on a cave floor, humming to herself. A voice behind the camera—presumably Ivy—speaks: “Okay, first ques—” There’s an ear-piercing shriek. The camera shakes, and then refocuses as a small gible completes her charge towards Vicky, teeth glowing with a signature Bite move. The gible’s teeth have sunk into Vicky’s straw hat, and Vicky is wrestling the dragon pokemon into submission.
Then, out of nowhere, an inky black tendril emerges from the darkness and WHACKS the gible, sending it flying into the wall. It impacts with a CRASH and when the dust clears a large crater can be seen.
Immediately after, a gray and navy blur launches itself away from the wall and towards the shadow with a roar. Immediately, the gible and the darkness engage in a vicious back-and forth. Vicky, shaking out her arm, just watches with an indulgent smile. Over the grunts and yells the viewer can hear Ivy’s voice repeating “what the f-, what the actual f-” over and over again.]
Comments 18.2k | Likes 24.1k | Rechirps 16.9k

@ZubatZoomer_11 Grounded?

— @wooperwhirl_888 grounded

— @rhyhornrumble_44 grounded

— @ElectricZapster Grounded

— @westpeninsulaarcaninetrainer | Arcany Dad Definitely grounded.

— @meowthmelody88 LOL

— @JoltiXer_242 lol

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Welcome to the IronVictory fanpage!

Victoria “Vicky” Ferrous (@IronVictory14), is a first-year trainer currently completing the Gym Circuit in Kanto. Her current gym status is unknown (since locations and battles are league-protected until they actually start selling the fight recordings, which you BET are going to be very, VERY discussed on here — we mods both can’t wait and are dreading it) but we’re fairly sure she has definitely completed at least 6, due to her allusions to Koga’s ninjas, and probably 8, since she was allowed to exit the region (location undisclosed, believe me we’ve TRIED to figure it out).

Her current known team includes: Milotic (plus flock of non-battlers), Arcanine, Chansey, Dragonite, Dratini (non-battler), Gyarados, a new ghost-type called Mimikyu, Gible, new pokemon called Goomy (plus puddle of non-battlers, typing unclear)

Rules:

1) No thirst of any kind. Keep it PG. Vicky is a minor, as are many members of this community. (Exception: GetGains Weight Training Club and affiliated members may say that they would like Chansey to “step on them,” mostly because we can’t get them to stop. Anyone else will be banned.)

2) Hate language is not tolerated. We are here for the enjoyment of the journey. Please be decent human beings.

3) No political statements. No exceptions. Impartial explanation of laws is fine. Mods will be scanning for this.

4) No spamming. Memes are fine, as long as there are no repeats.

5) Please tag all posts appropriately. Mis-tagged posts will be flagged and taken down by the mods.

6) We know she’s crazy. Please do not post more WTF chirps on our main page or unrelated posts, there is now a dedicated thread for freaking out. We are already very aware of the insanity that is Vicky’s Journey. All of these photos have gone through several rounds of editing detection—to our knowledge, they are all real. Yes, even that one. Please stop asking.

Before you start:

There are some things to know about this community before you jump into the posts on this page and the chirps on PidgeyChat.

1) Warnings: Vicky’s team includes popular-phobia-pokemon such as Gyarados, Dragonite, Gible, and a ghost-type called Mimikyu. Posts should be tagged and spoilered appropriately, but be extra cautious if those are potential triggers.

2) User Grass Supremacy (@creepingivy52) is apparently Vicky’s friend, Ivy, and occasionally posts on Vicky’s behalf when she is being particularly stupid cannot hold her phone. Arcany Dad (@westpeninsulaarcaninetrainer) and Kiba Is Done (@spiritpuppy132) are Vicky’s dad and IRL friend, respectively, and apparently Cat’s Meow (@persianperfection) is her grandmother. Please be respectful to their and Vicky’s privacy and do not call them out

3) No, Vicky is not aware of the insanity that is her journey (nor of the existence of this fan page—her parents know though). Attempts to reach out have been met with skepticism and disbelief (in a kind way but still), and the Parents have given the okay, so at this point just give up and enjoy the ride

Popular Topics list

- Link to the new WTF thread (keep the freak outs here pls)

- A deep-dive analysis of Vicky’s ever-changing nicknames

- Victoria Ferrous in research paper

- Is Vicky oblivious to her fame?

- How many goomies??

- Kanto-Johto regional trainer laws

- Protected pokemon subspecies & breeding laws

- Milotic posters

- Ninja Vicky

- How many research papers is Vicky featured in?

- What type is Goomy?

- Regional travel

- Is that a LEGENDARY?

- Chansey fanclub

- What to call a group of Goomy? [Thread closed, consensus: “puddle”]

- [Click here to see more]

Lance blinked at his screen. It was surprisingly well organized, especially for a fan page. Ho-Oh-knew his own fan page was a bit of a mess, as hard as his moderators were working to sort it out. It was a lot more difficult to dive through several years worth of champion records than to keep track of a relatively well-documented Journey like Victoria’s. 

Nonetheless, the sheer amount of posts and information on her page was… staggering.

Well then. He supposed it would be worth it, if only to track the progress of one of his potential challengers.

He hit “Follow.”

Then the rest of the posts on the page finished loading. He stared.

Was that a freaking ARTICUNO???

Chapter Text

Kiba knew from a young age that the world he lived in was dangerous.

Pokemon were beasts with abilities that could easily dispatch the average man. The billboards proclaimed it proudly, warning trainers against the perils of hubris, against venturing too far into the woods, against disturbing wild pokemon nests. Efforts and advertising had been expended to ensure trainers would have safer, tamer options if they were truly set on a Pokemon Journey: breeders, shelters, safeguards upon safeguards for the foolish, wandering teenager who believed themselves powerful enough, skilled enough, ignorant enough to venture from the world of men into a wilds of beasts and Pokemon.

Wild rattata were understood to be a danger, with their Bites and Hyper Fang. Wild Gyarados had been known to raze shorelines in their unceasing rage. A disturbed flock of Dragonite was once said to have created the Great Kanto Desert.

It was uncomfortable, knowing that he lived in a world hostile to mankind, in a world that catered towards Pokemon and a vicious, ever-changing cycle of life and death and sustenance. But it was a discomfort that Kiba and the people of this world had learned to live with.

Even with all that, nothing quite unsettled him so much as one Victoria Ferrous.

There was something off about Vicky.

He found her naive, at first, to see the world as a playground to traipse around in: to believe that one could befriend a Pokemon, as if a single Bite attack from the annoyed beast couldn’t rip off a limb in barely a second.

Then he thought her daring, and excessively lucky, and dismissed her.

But one day, he looked again. And again.

And couldn’t look away, slowly filled with dawning, terrified fascination.

It was like the rules of the world just… didn’t apply to her. She could choose to see a pokemon as aggressive, and then it was, or choose to befriend it, and then it became perfectly docile, curling itself submissively in her lap as she smiled down upon it like an indulgent caretaker. Something much older, much wiser, and so much more other than even the beasts that populated the world.

Around her, it was like people’s common sense just… turned off. Playground bullies easily ran off with a couple of impassioned words. Adults cooed over her, giving her advice and asking about their problems as if she could give them a conclusive answer. And somehow, she could talk to anyone in the town and indeed solve those issues, able one moment to hop fences and another just looking to all the world like she had always been in that place.

She could even find random items in shrubs just by looking through them, like they spawned in from one of Kiba’s video games, which he soon grew wary of touching at the thought by association. She could look one moment as her eyes were fixed on some invisible, far away horizon and then the next second repeat everything someone had said to her in the past five minutes. She just… showed up at some odd moments, gazing intently at Kiba and his friends as they worked through mucking the school Taurus’s stalls in their Pokemon studies class, as if what they were doing was utterly alien and fascinating to her. As if they were the odd ones.

It was like she was an indulgent adult playing pretend with a playground of children.

Eventually, Kiba concluded that this world, his world, was a playground to her.

Then she smiled at him, and he found himself not minding the deadly rattata on her lap, too focused on how her dimples made a blush rush to his face and ears.

“Oh, cool Rattata, Kiba!” Ivy cheered as she popped out from behind him, nearly startling Kiba. He quickly tensed and readjusted his arms as the Rattata he was holding in them glared at the new arrival.  “How’d you get him to like you so quickly?”

“I just… gave it a berry?” Kiba tilted his head. Then he blinked.

Why had he done that? He knew Rattata were dangerous. He knew he should stay away. And yet… it had seemed like the most natural thing in the world to take an Oran Berry and hold it out to the poor, trembling creatur— poor? Trembling?

What the heck? Since when… Why would he…

“Kiba?”

Kiba startled. He quickly blinked, covering for his momentary lapse—his heart beat quickly, a drum of fear and discomfort and wrong, wrong, wrong in his chest.

“S-sorry?” He stuttered, desperately trying to regain the thread of conversation.

Ivy glanced at him with a worried frown, but repeated herself. “I was just wondering if you were going to capture him? It seems like you two have a good relationship.”

“O-oh,” Kiba hesitated, “yeah. Um.”

Ivy beamed at him, and pressed Automatically, he presented the ball to his— the Rattata, and the rodent cheerfully pressed the button. Ivy congratulated him, suddenly distracted by the signature waving stalks of a Vine Whip, a sure sign that there was a grass-type battling somewhere close. She absently patted him on the back, cheered him one more time, and ran off.

Kiba’s eyes followed after her, and then, as if pulled by some inexorable force, they shifted to the side and settled on the silhouette of Vicky, gazing at the scene as Ivy ran off with a fond smile on her face.

“What the heck,” Kiba whispered to himself, still rooted to the spot. “What is happening?”

Two hours later, Kiba was the proud owner of a small, nondescript black notebook.

If he tried, he might be able to document the changes that were happening to the world. He could keep himself sane, keep himself aware of what was happening, and maybe find a way to stop it. Either way, journaling was supposed to be good for you, right?

By that evening, the first three pages had already been filled.

The rules of the world were changing.

Kiba knew this. Kiba saw this. Kiba had kept a record in his little black notebook for ages now, ever since Vicky had gone off on her journey and the world had seemed to hold its breath.

No one else noticed.

Kiba felt like he was slowly going insane.

Wherever Vicky went, suddenly people started becoming friends. Towns were pulled together by some invisible magnetism, creating small communities where everyone knew everyone else, and Ms. Lilac next door knew that Mr. Tomlinson two streets over had fresh beets in his garden where they had once never even known each others’ names. Near bridges, Magicarp and Marill bounced happily, unperturbed by the crossing bikes and pedestrians where they once would have fled or blasted water at unsuspecting passers-by. Kiba had nearly recoiled once upon seeing a Chansey loose and uncaptured in a Pokemon Center. 

When he ran into the local Officer Jenny, Kiba could hardly stop himself from freezing as fight-or-flight instinct took over at the fierce, sharp teeth of the officer’s happy growlithe, trotting alongside her characteristic motorcycle as if the puppy couldn’t be happier.

His flinching was thankfully overlooked with only a brief nod of curiosity, and Kiba quickly fled.

In the untouched wilds, however, nothing had changed.

Kiba knew this because he had gone out there and been attacked by a swarm of territorial Scyther. What a strange experience, he mused, to feel relief while a blade was hurtling towards his neck.

Then he had quickly ducked to avoid an Oddish shooting Acid at his exposed chest, rolling back into a sprint, and all relief and curiosity was lost to a never-ending litany of swears as he charged through the forest.

He tried to approach a professor only once. He was laughed out of the office before he could finish.

Nothing seemed to change for Kiba, even as the world changed around him.

He watched on the television as trainers celebrated with their pokemon after conference wins, the pokemon hugging back where they would have once severed a limb at the unwelcome, sudden proximity. He nodded to Officer Jenny and gave her a wide berth. He treated his own pokemon with distant, cautious respect, though his own “partners” were somehow wary of him —as if his own caution was a deviation from the norm, as if they could not even fathom why a trainer would look at them, take in their teeth and claws and scales, Poison Powder and Quick Attack and Thunderbolts, and see them as anything other than friends.

As if Kiba were somehow other.

Vicky knocked at his door one day with a cup of hot chocolate and the Champion’s pin on her overly large straw hat. They sat at a table on the front yard together in silence, Kiba sipping his drink, and Vicky simply looking out at the city view.

She never drank, Kiba noticed, nor did she eat. It certainly wasn’t the strangest observation he’d had of her by far.

“You terrify me,” he said simply.

“Huh?” The creature that called herself Vicky blinked at him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Kiba hesitated. “…nothing.”

There was a moment of silence.

“How do you—” make everyone love each other– “–get along so well with everyone?”

Vicky said nothing for a long, long while. But Kiba could wait. He sipped his drink slowly. It was sweet.

“I love pokemon,” was all she said at last.

“…and—” humans– “–people?”

“I love them too.”

Kiba said nothing.

“I want them both to get along. I want people to love them as much as I do.”

Kiba sighed.

At last, that was it. This was the truth that he simply did not want to face.

It wasn’t a diabolical scheme to take over the world. It wasn’t a master manipulator changing the world for her own benefit. Vicky, for all that she seemed incontrovertibly other, also seemed almost… childish, in her desires. In her love for the world.  Perhaps she wasn’t even aware of the effect she had on everything around her. 

It was almost insultingly simple.

“Okay,” Kiba capitulated, finally. “I think I like it better when people are peaceful, anyway.”

Vicky grinned happily at him, and began chattering on about her Gyrados’s new moves, and how much her Arcanine loved spices, and how adorable her Mimikyu was when he hugged her tight despite that pressure being enough to rip the arms off of lesser creatures.

Kiba just smiled.

In the back room, a small black notebook sat collecting dust, forgotten.

Chapter Text

Vicky loved having a ghost type to train. The typing was all about pranks, sneaky attacks, revenge, and thinking laterally, and Vicky was having the time of her life figuring out all the different combos. Of course, she continued the gravity training, even if she wasn’t sure if it would do much for ghosts, but it was the new variations that had her giggling with glee. Could she sneak behind another pokemon? Use their attacks to generate shadow? Create an artificial shadow-type field to her advantage by blocking out some light? What about the fairy type? What if they added Misty Terrain on top of that? Could the two of them destroy a dragon in a single hit with the typing combo? There were so many options!

Plus, Mimikyu was just the sweetest, most affectionate little eldritch creature she had ever come across. She loved him and wanted to hug him and give him all the berries and good things in the world—

Ahem.

Mimikyu adored Vicky, and Vicky adored Mimikyu…

Her parents, not so much.

“Victoria Ferrous,” her mother began, eyelid faintly twitching.

Oh boy, Vicky thought, full name, the eyelid twitch, and the calm voice. That was absolutely, definitely, never a good sign.

“That is the third window you have broken this week,” her mother flatly announced, fixing her with a piercing glare that had her freezing in place and her heart rate skittering.

Vicky glanced to the side at the shards of glass, casualties from her most recent game of frisbee with Mimikyu and his long shadow-arm-tendrils. She winced.

“The neighbors are having nightmares every night,” her mother continued inexorably, “they are thinking of moving away, and we’ve had to convince Jenny four times about your status as a pokemon trainer for ghosts. The local precinct is this close to slapping us with a fine from all of the distressed calls our neighbors have been sending them.”

“But Mimikyu isn’t—”

“Victoria.”

Vicky snapped her mouth shut.

Each word her mother said fell heavily on Vicky’s head. “Considering all of this, we have had to take drastic action.”

Vicky’s heart dropped to her stomach.

At that exact moment, the doorbell rang.

Vicky jolted.

Oh, no. She didn’t know what, she didn’t know who, but her mother had a relieved look on her face that only spelled bad news for Vicky and her plans for the rest of the day to teach Mimikyu how to punch above his weight class. 

With bated breath, Vicky turned slowly to face the front door…

“Hello, brat,” Agatha of the Elite Four grinned manically at her from the threshold, “I heard you needed ghost playdates.”

Oh. My. Arceus.

Vicky beamed in pure elation.

Heck yeah.

Vicky was packed and set to go in less than two minutes, Mimikyu bouncing beside her like a child on caffeine.

Or maybe it was the presence of Agatha’s Haunter, which Vicky had caught her little ghost ‘mon staring at, star struck, as the other pokemon flexed his ghostly, fog-outlined muscles, before Agatha gently whapped Haunter on the head. Vicky giggled to herself, and squeezed Mimikyu in a tight hug.

(As Vicky frantically shoved everything she would need for the day in a backpack—food, snacks, treats, pokeballs, phone— oh Arceus am I forgetting anything Agatha is going to train me— she missed the frantic conversation that was happening downstairs.

“Agatha,” Vicky’s mother sighed, and spoke in a low voice, “this is not meant to be fun. It’s meant to teach Vicky how to train a ghost type without putting the fear of the Birds into the entire neighborhood.”

“That’s right!” The old woman grinned unsettlingly wide. “Nothing better than a ghost playdate with my team to teach a young ghostie.”

“Agatha, that’s not what we meant,” her dad sighed long-sufferingly.

“Well that’s what I heard!” Agatha replied with her signature cackle, and refused to listen to Vicky’s parents continued whispered arguments.)

“Come along, young Victoria,” Agatha called out as Vicky careened back towards the front door, backpack yanked and swinging behind her, “time to show you how a ghost trainer does things!”

Vicky whooped and leapt down the stairs after her, and the front door swung shut on her parents’ dead-eyed stares. Once they had reached the end of the walkway to the street, where a small, squat car sat waiting on the gravel curb, Vicky adjusted her bag and grinned at the old lady.

“Thanks for training me.” Vicky joyfully bowed her head.

“‘Course, girlie,” Agatha snickered. “Doesn’t hurt that I can get a closer look at this lovely little pokemon you have here. Now, you two ready for the full ghost experience?”

Vicky and Mimikyu looked at each other. Then Vicky blinked up guilelessly at the old lady—the high-ranking, well-trained, experience member of the Elite Four. “…Could I maybe prank Lance a bit?”

Agatha’s answering grin nearly split her face in two.

They did, in fact, prank Lance a bit.

Mimikyu, phasing into Lance’s office while the man had exited for a brief minute or so, easily switched out his “Champion” plaque, hiding it in the bottom drawer of his desk under a stack of old and misfiled documents. Instead, Vicky had quickly scrawled a set of words onto a scrap piece of paper, which was now proudly declaring to all and sundry that Lance Blackthorn was now:

LANCE BLACKTHORN
GREATEST FLYING-TYPE TRAINER
(Maybe someday he’ll have more than 2 dragon-types)

Of course, for plausible deniability, Vicky of course had absolutely no idea what the note read, and was with Agatha in her backyard the entire time. And who would doubt the official word of an Elite Four member?

Agatha was the best.

By the time they arrived at Agatha’s training ground, Mimikyu was practically buzzing nonstop from happiness and all the love. He hadn’t stopped scurrying all over Vicky in sheer joy. The feel of the tendrils sweeping over her arms and neck and chest made her giggle, which only sent the small pokemon into more of a tizzy.

Agatha watched over them with a practiced eye, a small smile curving the corner of her lips upwards. At last, she stood before a simple, rickety old fence that looked close to falling apart, the lock rusted and hinges creaking ever so slightly in the wind. The fence itself was taller than Vicky, blocking sight into the area beyond. The wood of the fence was crooked, bowed, and pock-marked with holes, the paint having peeled off long ago. Around them, empty fields stretched into hills, with several structures and barns dotting the landscape. 

Agatha kicked the gate and it squealed on rusted hinges.

“Well, come on then,” she beckoned.

Vicky and Mimikyu glanced at each other, and, in sync, carefully stepped through the gate. In front of them was more field, stretching on like the grass behind them, and—

Vicky stopped and stared.

Before her, towering in the center of the empty grassy area, lay a colorful patchwork of balloon-like structures, shaped vaguely into a cube. Round columns stood at each corner, with the walls and ceilings inflated and jiggling gently in the breeze. It was a chaos of shapes and colors, and it was also very, very familiar.

“It’s a bouncy house,” Vicky said faintly.

“Heh.” Agatha behind her only snickered.

“Oh my Arceus, it’s a bouncy house,” Vicky repeated, stunned.

Agatha cackled again and immediately tossed several pokeballs into the air, letting her ghosts loose. Several beams of red light shot out towards the large balloon castle, embedding themselves in the walls and pillars and floor, and briefly making the shadows almost pulse with a living darkness. A chorus of shrieks and cries echoed across the wide open field as the ghosts announced their presence.

The bounce house walls seemed to expand. There was no other word for it: the house itself grew swollen around the sides, tendrils of shadow and ghost-like energy creeping around the walls as it squatted down into the ground. The balloon house inflated more and more, filling with partially-dematerialized pokemon until it was swollen to the brink…

Then, with a piercing cry, the house floomphed in an abrupt deflation—a Haunter burst from the ceiling of the bounce house and rocketed himself into the air above the field, rapidly disappearing into the sky. He reached the apex of the jump, now barely a speck in the distance, and began hurtling back down towards the ground. At the last second, Haunter partially dematerialized right at the crown of the house, swallowed back inside like liquid in a cup, and the house abruptly ballooned out again.

Immediately after, every single other ghost followed in an unholy bombardment of partially-solid pokemon slingshotting themselves around the yard and into the bouncy castle. Shrieks and haunting cries of joy and ghostly excitement echoed over the yard. The bounce house itself seemed to be dancing—well, Vicky supposed someone else would probably describe it as vomiting—with the pressure and movement of the ghosts as they bounced around, solidifying themselves to hit a wall only to dematerialize to shoot themselves out of the bounce house like rockets.

Vicky glanced down at the little ghost type next to her.

Mimikyu had flipping stars in his eyes.

Vicky was melting at that look. Just… flipping melting.

Mimikyu was the cutest! Mimikyu deserved all the best things! Dammit, now she wanted a bounce house at home too!

“Go on,” Vicky nudged Mimikyu, who stared back up at her like a goddess, quickly switching his gaze back and forth from the Bouncy Castle of Awesomeness to her fond smile.

“KkkkUUkk!” Mimikyu… well, squealed was the only word for it, in an unholy screeching sound of nails on chalkboard and grinding metal, the absolute happiest sound that Vicky didn’t know he could make. She beamed widely at him.

Mimikyu practically teleported into the bounce house in pure excitement. 

Immediately, a clamor of unholy screeching, cackling, and ominous cracking sounds resounded from inside the bounce house.

Three seconds later, a Mimikyu-shaped blur blasted into the sky with a near-sonic BOOM.

Vicky stared off into the sky, squinting faintly. After a moment that stretched on far longer than she would have originally thought, Vicky could faintly make out a dark speck in the clear blue sky drifting downwards. Another five more seconds, and the ballooning shape of a doll-shaped dress floated gently down out of the sky, drifting side to side like a feather, tumbling and somersaulting through the air, and landed with nary a sound on the soft grass. 

As the two humans continued to watch silently, Mimikyu swished around and turned to stare at the bouncy house.

Vicky felt a niggling tendril of worry for exactly two seconds before Mimikyu immediately threw himself back into the bounce house, and another chorus of unholy noises resounded, this time with a triumphant, cackling, crackling screech underpinning the cacophony. 

Vicky turned and stared seriously at Agatha. “This,” she told her in utmost solemnity, “is the best thing ever.”

Agatha cackled louder. Suddenly, it seemed like every single one of the ghosts infesting the bounce house (and in various stages of falling back down to earth around it) of it cackled louder. The shadows seemed to stretch, the dark seemed to almost glow, and Vicky was absolutely ecstatic.

“The best part, girlie?” Agatha grinned at her, mouth stretching unnaturally wide, her faithful Haunter echoing her smile with teeth in the old woman’s shadow. “No annoying neighbors want to move in for miles.”

Vicky stared at the Bouncy Monstrosity in utter adoration.

Victoria Ferrous decided right then and there that this was no longer a matter of vague contemplation: she needed a bounce house. It was perfectly understandable, and a perfect bonding opportunity and exercise. It was a professional expense for the health and wellbeing of her pokemon… It was obligatory. No two ways about it.

Yep. That was definitely it.

Now if only Dragonite and Gyarados could get in on the action… But sadly, the bounce house was human sized, and Dragonite and Gyarados were a bit too big. They would need such a huge bounce house, and maybe even commission one to be built from scratch, and then that would have to be puncture resistant in case Gible wanted to have a go, and then maybe waterproof, and that would take a whole ton of money—

Wait a minute.

Thanks to the Milotic flock, they had enough money to build one, didn’t they? And Mom did say that they had been getting a LOT of money from their investments through the Clan…

Heck yeah.

Now, how to pitch this idea to her parents for the highest probability of success?

Chapter Text

In many universes, Victoria Ferrous would go off to become a Pokemon Champion, then Pokemon Professor, while staying completely unbiased towards any pokemon she met.

In this universe, Gram-gram had just the slightest bit more of an influence on Vicky. Just the slightest.

Vicky… was a cat person.

To her dad’s despair.

Don’t get me wrong, Vicky still loved the growlithe — her parents weren’t sure if anything at all could dissuade Vicky from her all-encompassing adoration for all kinds of pokemon — but cats were special.

She loved playing with Persian, even though Persian treated her at first with queenly disdain, Vicky quickly melted through the cat’s tough exterior and managed to wheedle a couple of cuddles out of the normally aloof feline.

Vicky tried to explain to her uncomprehending father how that attitude was part of Persian’s charm. Her dad just decided to chalk it up to her having strange likes—case in point, Vicky’s general fascination with all kinds of dangerous and deadly pokemon—and that was that.

Not for Vicky, though. For Vicky, like Gram-gram, loving cats was an all-consuming obsession.

Then the Milotic incident happened, and then Arcanine incident happened, and Dad was too stunned and busy to think much more about Vicky’s previous obsession with cats.

Gram-gram, though, Gram-gram never forgot.

Right before Vicky set off on her Journey, the old lady pulled her aside.

“You have a lot of canines, young lady.” Gram-gram told her, solemnity etched into every wrinkle of her face. “And fish, beautiful though they might be.”

Vicky nodded seriously. “My pokemon are awesome.”

Gram-gram stares at her piercingly. For a moment, no one spoke. Then, finally, Gram-gram opened her mouth. “Bring back a cat, granddaughter mine.”

Vicky grinned and solemnly agreed.

Gram-gram simply smiled back and sent her granddaughter off.

Her foolish son and wife never did realize that a true cat-lover’s obsession never stopped.

“Prepare for trouble!”

“And make it double!”

Vicky sighed.

Sometimes she wondered why she didn’t just release Arcanine to punt the Rocket idiots into the stratosphere already. But Ash and his friends seemed to listen to the full thing everytime. Maybe some kind of weird show of respect?

So she waited.

“… Meowth that’s right!”

Vicky froze. How could she have forgotten this??

She might not have cared much about Meowth before — back when she had been watching the anime, he was a fond annoyance more than anything, and occasionally his voice grated a little on her ears. She wouldn’t have said she was particularly attached to him as a fictional character. But now… Now she was a proud Cat Person.

And this… this was a talking cat.

“Oh my Arceus!” Vicky swiftly interrupted the monologuing in the background. “You’re so cool!”

Ash turned around with a big grin on his face… and then noticed Vicky staring intently at Meowth from barely a hand’s breadth away from his face, with the pokemon awkwardly backing up a step.

“Hey!” Ash yelled indignantly.

Misty held out a hesitant hand as if to grab her. “Uh, Vicky…”

Vicky whirled around. “Shush! I haven’t finished!” Then turning back to the Rocket Trio: “You must have worked so hard to learn how to speak! That’s amazing, you must be so dedicated. And your fur! You’re…” For the next five minutes Vicky cheerfully extolled the virtues of cats to a not-quite-captive-but-certainly-frozen audience, and how awesome Meowth was and how cool it would be for pokemon to talk… “…and would you please, please come home with me?”

There was a moment of uncomprehending silence as Ash, Misty, Brock, Jessie, James, and Meowth all attempted to process what just occurred.

Then Jessie bristled. “Hey! Meowth is ours!”

“Yeah!” James added, “you can’t simply take him away!”

Vicky blinked. “Oh! I didn’t cover that?”

“No you didn’t! And Meowth isn’t going anywhere!” Jessie huffed.

“Not without us at least!” James added.

“No way!” Vicky frantically waved her hands in denial. “I would never separate a cat from its subjects.”

Jessie laughed imperiously. “Of course not! Wait, subj—”

“So that’s why all of you are coming home with me!”

There was a moment of shocked silence. Everyone seemed to be frozen like statues, staring mouth agape at Vicky.

“Wait, what???” Jessie, James, Meowth, Ash, Misty, and Brock all exclaimed in unison.

“Hey Gram-gram!” The front door of the house was swiftly kicked open by one of Vicky’s signature boots. “I brought you a cat! And his people!”

Immediately, she could hear thumping footsteps, and soon her dad came into view through the threshold. He started towards her, then froze, taking in the scene.

Behind Vicky, Arcanine was happily slobbering over a defeated man with blue hair and woman with long red hair, lying on the ground and half-conscious in a puddle of drool. To her left, he spotted the unique shape of her Chansey, with what looked like a meowth hauled over her shoulder like a sack of potatoes.

He blinked.

“Vicky…”

“It’s not what it looks like—”

“Victoria Ferrous.”

Vicky snapped her mouth shut.

Her dad sighed. “Vicky, we talked about this, you can’t kidnap trainers for their cats—”

“But this one talks—”

“You still can’t—wait, talks?”

“Gram-gram!” Vicky ignored her dad’s sputtering and called past him into the house.

Barely two seconds later, Gram-gram seemed to materialize behind her son with a cheerful cackle. “Listen to your parents, granddaughter mine, kidnapping is bad form. You don’t want to give us cat lovers a bad reputation, do you?”

Vicky deflated. That was right… if she forced cats on people, people would be less likely to see their glory… “Sorry, Gram-gram.”

In the far back of the room, her mom quietly muttered, “seriously, how on earth do you get her to listen to you?” but no one listened or heard.

With the ease of long practice, Gram-gram pushed her way past her son to cast a critical eye over the disorganized assemblage of pokemon and criminals. “Now let’s see you all.” Her eye wandered over James and Jessie. “You both should get more food in you, hmph…”

“Hey! It’s not our fault!” Jessie protested.

“Yeah, food’s hard when y’er on the run!” Meowth chimed in.

Gram-gram’s eyes snapped over to Meowth, and the most fascinating transformation took over her face. She suddenly looked twenty years younger, full of vitality and enthusiasm (at least to Vicky. Her dad had once commented that she looked like a demon, and that he was worried Vicky was going to learn her bad habits. She had slapped him gently but sternly over the head with a broom while Vicky watched, uncomprehending). 

“Oh you’re a beautiful one, aren’t you! Such talent, such poise, such eloquence…” Gram-gram started cooing. Jessie and James watched, mouth-agape, as she scritched just under Meowth’s ear and the pokemon melted.

“Hey!” Jessie interjected, quickly shaking the shock off, “he’s ours!”

Gram-gram cackled. “Of course! Not going to take a king away from his subjects, now am I?”

“The twerpette said the same thing…” Jessie muttered.

“Oh dear.” James shuddered. “There’s two of them…”

Gram-gram materialized a cat grooming kit from out of literally nowhere—Vicky really needed to learn how to do that, ASAP, because that was literally so cool— and in a couple seconds Meowth was like putty in her hands. Vicky couldn’t help but notice a curious gleam from Jessie’s eyes. 

Oh? Vicky narrowed her eyes at Jessie in interest. A prospective cat lover? Or maybe just groomer? Or Contest competitor? Her mouth slowly widened into an unholy grin.

Of course, if Vicky could notice a burgeoning interest in cats, Gram-gram, being far more experienced in the art of being a Cat Person, had already begun plotting. The old lady reached out a grasping, gnarled hand and grabbed Jessie by the elbow, yanking her over and ignoring the yelp of alarm and surprise.

“All right then, young lady. See, this is how you groom them with a high quality kit! Come learn from the best…” Gram-gram’s arm trapped Jessie like a vice, and, helplessly, the red-haired woman was dragged off to the depths of the house.

“Oh dear, there’s more of them,” her dad and James mumbled to themselves in sync. 

They snapped their heads to look at each other with shock, appreciation, and commiserating sympathy.

Then they immediately realized that one was the parent of their kidnapper, and one was the man their daughter kidnapped, huffed, and looked away.

Well, this was going better than she had expected!

One month later, Vicky came home to the sound of Jessie arguing with Gram-gram over a game of backgammon. Her dad seemed to be in his office, and her mom was out, probably catching up with Ivy’s parents. She would be home soon, though, since Ivy came back with her. Vicky grinned and slipped into the living room. There, she spotted Meowth lazing about on the couch. Vicky let herself fall down on the floor next to him.

“Happy?” She asked.

Meowth nodded distractedly. “Sure thing, twerpette. ‘Dis is so much better than bein’ on the run all the time!”

Vicky whooped, but Meowth wasn’t done.

“But James looks like he’s feelin’ kinda down, an’ we can’t get anythin’ outta him…”

Vicky dropped her arms to her lap. “I’ll look into it,” she promised. Anything for cats!

Meowth purred as Persian padded over and rubbed her cheek against his. “You do that, twerpette. I’m gonna go hang out with this lovely lady here…”

Meowth and Persian went off to do… something. Vicky didn’t want to know, and was content not knowing.

Vicky found James in the backyard, playing with the pack of growlithe, uncharacteristically slow movements and low general energy belying a clear internal turmoil. She ambled over and plopped herself down beside James, carefully moving a few puppies to the side as they inquisitively nudged her feet and hands. “Hey, James!”

“Hey…” came James’s morose greeting. The normally peppy petty criminal was slumped over his knees, staring wistfully at the five growlithe in training currently playing about in their yard. His eyes followed as one flipped over with a playful growl, batting away his sibling, then leaping to his feet and loping off in a joyful game of tag. The two puppies that had been clambering all over his lap quickly joined the race, and it soon became a pack of fluffy puppies chasing each other across the lawn.

“Sooooo…” Vicky trailed off. “I heard—” from watching the anime, “—that you had a Growlithe at some point…”

“… yeah… My little Growlie…” James slumped further.

Vicky felt a twinge of sympathy. “You miss him, don’t you?”

James nodded sadly, still staring mournfully after the happily roughhousing pile of growlithe on the other end of the yard, and missed her considering look.

Barely three days later, Vicky returned home and kicked the door open once again, ignoring her mother's despairing sigh as the hinges bent just a little more to the right. “I'm home!” She shouted, “hey James! Meowth! Jessie! I got you a present!”

James’s ecstatic expression upon seeing Growlie bounding joyfully over to him, tears flying behind both of them, would remain etched in her memory. As would Meowth's (and Jessie's) ruefully relieved grin at the sight, which swiftly transitioned into heavy teasing as James's face continually collected happy puppy slobber.

Vicky glanced over and noted Dad’s considering look toward James. He was probably starting to view him as a fellow Growlithe aficionado, which boded well for the TRio’s future settling in here, and therefore Meowth’s chances of staying long-term. She just barely caught his quiet mutter: “Maybe now the dog people can try and outnumber the cat people in this house…”

Vicky grinned at the touching scene, and surreptitiously shoved the arrest record of one Jessebelle further into her coat pocket.

Anything for cats.

Chapter Text

Vicky stared at Mewtwo.

“You are the best,” she proclaimed seriously.

Mewtwo gaped at her. “Pardon?”

This tiny female human child had just disembarked her Dragonite and stalked towards him like a determined soldier, only to park herself in front of him— him, a Legendary! One that had, not a week ago, threatened to destroy most of humanity! Did she have absolutely no sense of self-preservation?—and stare with her arms crossed over her chest.

How did she get here? His island was supposed to be uninhabited. The events at New Island weren't reported, and he had thoroughly wiped everyone's memory of the event. There should be nothing linking him back to this place. Yet here was a tiny female human child staring at him with—were those sparkles in her eyes?

“You.” She pointed at him again. “Are the best.”

Mewtwo just stared, flabbergasted.

Thankfully, the female child saw fit to continue. “You’re a cat—”

Mewtwo’s face contorted into an immediate snarl—

“—and a person,” she finished, oblivious to her impending doom.

Mewtwo swiftly manifested his claws in order to shred this impertinent human apart—but the sheer awe in her voice made him pause.

“…the coolest! Oh my gosh! You’re a leader of an entire pokemon colony, you’re actually a good trainer despite having pretty much no context or experience, you—”

Who was this child? What was she doing here? What made her psychic signature give off such unbridled joy at his appearance? Truly, what in the name of—

“…like, seriously, you’re so smart? You made a Pokemon cloning machine, I don’t think humans have even come up with the beginnings of that idea yet—”

All right, how did she know that? That was classified to Distortion and back—

“…and you’re also like, one of the most forgiving and genuinely good people I know, seriously, you can forgive humanity despite all the shitty things that happened to you—which, by the way, that freaking sucks and I would be totally down with a little arson or petty crime if you’re interested—or pranks, oooh I have some good ideas—”

Mewtwo just stared at her as the human female continued to gush about him and his… moral compass? What in Arceus’s name?

He resolutely ignored the small, tiny flower of warmth that was blooming, ever so slowly, in his chest.

He was not touched. This child was a liability. A huge one. Now if only she would tell him where she got all of this information from—

“—Oh! And I’m Vicky, by the way, short for Victoria Ferrous—”

Great, now he had her name. It wasn’t looking like this child—Victoria Ferrous—was going to leave anytime soon. Maybe he could probe her a bit…

“—and oh my gosh that fight with Mew? That was kind of terrifying to be honest, but also super cool, and I really admire your dedication and compassion—”

Mewtwo, meanwhile, was still stuck a couple sentences back, still attempting—with all of his Legendary psychic abilities—to figure out how in the name of Arceus this foetus knew all of this information. Again, he was certain he had erased everyone’s memories. But that presented a new problem: how far back did she know about him? He couldn’t erase her memories because he had no idea how much he would be erasing, and for all that he threatened the extinction of humanity and everyone who aided in the laboratory experiments he wasn’t about to make the child brain dead for no reason…

Mewtwo tuned back into the conversation to hear the tail end of the child’s—oddly flattering—rambling speech:

“—PLEASE come see my Gram-gram!”

… Excuse me?

Victoria Ferrous—apparently that was her name—looked at him quietly with—oh Arceus, had the sparkles in her eyes gotten bigger? It was like staring at a baby Growlithe. Or one of his tiny cloned baby Pokemon.

Arceus-dammit.

This was giving him a bloody headache.

“... Sure,” he agreed tiredly. If that would get this incomprehensible child off his back, he would accompany her for a short period of time to see this… 'Gram-gram.'

Victoria Ferrous whooped, jumping up in the air and projecting far too much mental excitement and energy. Mewtwo sighed.

An Arceus-damn headache, mark his words.

A statement only corroborated when Victoria Ferrous, after a short flight (the child on her Dragonite—the pokemon radiating a surprising fondness for her trainer, so different from some of the trainers from before, yet so similar to that one trainer with the spiky hair…) bounded towards the front door of an otherwise unremarkable house in an otherwise unremarkable human suburb and pounded on the door.

“Gram-gram!” She shouted.

Curious. So this Gram-gram is a relation of hers? Mewtwo wondered.

An older human female with white hair and a set of what could only be described as dignified wrinkles opened the door. Gram-gram! Victoria Ferrous's thoughts clamored.

Hmm. So this was the formidable Gram-gram.

The woman's eyes flew past her granddaughter, only to land on him. Almost immediately, they sparkled. “You’re a cat and a person! ”

Oh no, Mewtwo immediately realized, there’s another one.

Mewtwo got pulled—quite against his will, thank you very much, though Vicky would comment that he didn’t put up any resistance whatsoever, let alone just teleported out of there—into a family dinner.

“So!” Gram-gram clapped her hands together. The look on her face would have been menacing, had her psychic signature not been completely cheerful and anticipatory. “What might your favorite food be, sir?”

He… wasn’t entirely sure.

Of course, verbalizing these thoughts did not seem to be the right answer, as both humans bristled in… was that offense? Mewtwo tilted his head and focused. Yes, offense. How small-minded of these humans, to be offended at the truth… wait.

He carefully sorted out the psychic signals and their whirling thoughts. It was more difficult with creatures he was unfamiliar with than the pokemon he lived with on his island, particularly with minds as active as these two, but he was a Legendary, and a psychic at that. Sorting through the tangle of impressions, emotions, and thoughts was simplicity itself. Interpreting the foreign sensations took a slight bit longer, but what was left was…

Offense on his behalf.

Hm.

This was… odd. He blinked.

Next thing he knew, the two human females had begun rifling through the large container they called a “fridge,” grabbing various packages and shoving them onto the table.

“—the dumplings, too, they’re over there—”

“—not that, Victoria, it is an absolute travesty of a lasagna, I can do so much better even with these wrinkles…”

“—Gram-gram, I can’t reach the cherri jam—”

“—the oran too, Trouble—”

“—oh my gosh, I almost forgot the chocolate! Wait, can cats—”

“—get a move on, graddaughter mine, we can’t leave him to starve—”

Victoria glared at him, though there seemed to be little to no heat behind the gaze, and pointed a vicious finger in his face. Mewtwo nearly went cross-eyed following the abrupt movement.

“We’re going to get you a favorite food!” She exclaimed, then turned back to tossing the contents of her fridge onto the table in front of him. 

In what seemed like no time at all (could humans Teleport? That was a no, right? But there now seemed to be scientific evidence disproving that fact…) Mewtwo found himself with a plate, a full set of cutlery, and a vast, expansive, and varied assortment of foods laid out in front of him. The table itself nearly groaned under the weight.

Mewtwo blinked again, baffled.

What…

Bit by bit, under the expectant, sparkling gazes of the child and the Gram-gram, Mewtwo carefully sampled some dishes. His eyes widened.

It was… good. Not at all like the wild berries he had been foraging, and certainly nowhere near the lab sludge he had subsisted on before… He ate some more.

There was an odd fuzziness slowly growing in his chest. Was he sick? Was this human food making him ill? But it didn’t feel bad…

He felt… pampered.

Mewtwo jumped as something nudged against his leg. He looked down.

A Persian was nuzzling against him. He spotted another smaller meowth along the far wall, the kitten cautiously creeping forward with wide, innocent eyes. Behind her, another kitten stumbled over his feet on the approach.

In the blink of an eye, Mewtwo found himself in what could only be described as a cat cuddle puddle against the far wall of the living room. It was comfortable.

He also very much had no idea what was going on, but unlike before, he found he didn’t mind that as much. He was… happy?

Unconsciously, a rumble started in his chest, gradually growing into a quiet purr.

Mewtwo pointedly ignored the frantic whispers of conversation in the background from the two humans.  The pure joy practically emanating from their psychic signatures was like an annoying buzzing fly. He just purred harder, and found himself slipping off into a light doze.

Vicky’s father tiredly opened the door to the house. It had been a nice evening meeting with the Vinewoods, but he and his wife were a little tired after a long day of work. He had noticed a second Arcanine out back—was Vicky home? Hopefully she hadn’t caused too much trouble again, though the fact that he came home and the house was still standing was a good sign… He sighed again. He really had low bars for acceptable levels of chaos when it came to his daughter, didn’t he? His mother would berate him for that… or just join in the chaos, he could never tell which.

He pushed open the front door, blinking as his eyes adjusted to the gloom in the living room—

There was an unfamiliar lump in the cat bed.

His wife stumbled as she collided with his suddenly unmoving back. He opened his mouth to shout—

Someone slapped a hand on his mouth. He immediately began struggling—

“Shhh, dad, you’re going to wake him up—” Vicky’s unmistakable voice hissed. Immediately, heart pounding, he stilled.

“Victoria Ferrous,” his wife hissed. Instinctively, he flinched, even though the tone wasn’t directed towards him. “What. Did. You. Bring. Home?”

“Ahah…” Vicky laughed nervously. Behind her, he could faintly make out the shape of Gram-gram sneaking away from the confrontation and towards the kitchen.

“Mother,” he whispered, quite calmly for the situation, all things considered. “Get back here. Right now. And explain.”

He was normally a calm man, but right this instant he was this close to blowing a gasket.

He wasn’t going to get much sleep that night, was he?

Vicky had never seen Gram-gram act sheepish before, and hopefully never would again.

The two of them endeavored to explain Mewtwo’s situation to her decidedly unimpressed parents. It was a lot of backs and forths — “how do you know that,” “what made you decide this was a good idea,” “Trouble, really?” and “Gram-gram, this is your fault too,” and the ever-menacing, “Victoria Ferrous, you are grounded” (and to the side, a glare and a mutter of “Gram-gram, I would absolutely ground you if I could”). 

Eventually, the conversation gradually slowed as the two of them ran out of inventive ways to emphatically repeat that Mewtwo was a good cat, the best cat, and also one of the kindest people she had ever met. 

Her parents still didn’t look all too impressed, though slightly mollified.

But, well, what were they going to do, kick him out? And face not only her wrath, but Gram-gram’s as well? Hah. No way.

Vicky grinned in triumph.

When Mewtwo woke up, she would start subtly asking whether he wanted to move into a guest bedroom, or use the couch, get a cat bed, or even keep the current arrangement. There were plenty of options!

But for now, she smiled fondly at the large shape buried under several smaller, fluffy shapes in the corner of the living room, and went to sleep.

Chapter Text

Vicky was fairly sure this was going to happen eventually, at the rate she was going. She stared at the floating pink pokemon in front of her.

Mew stared back. 

Well then. She found a Mew. Or, well, Mew found her. 

Vicky blinked.

Mew blinked back.

Vicky giggled.

Mew giggled.

Vicky immediately began making faces, and Mew mirrored her with each one.

This went on for a good hour or so. Vicky was really getting along great with this cat-like pokem— wait a minute.

Cat.

Vicky grinned. Mew giggled.

“You knew all along, didn’t you?”

Mew just giggled, swirled around and hovered upside down, then booped Vicky on the nose.

Vicky laughed, rolling around on the grass. “Oh, Gram-gram is going to love you.” Then she considered the Mew for a moment. “Are you ok with pokeballs?”

Mew swirled around, thinking hard. She hopped around on thin air staring at everything around them, inspecting Vicky’s own pokeballs, her hat, her eyes, and booped her nose one more time. Vicky giggled quietly. Then Mew carefully shook her head no, staring curiously at Vicky as if waiting for a reaction.

Vicky didn’t even notice, barrelling forward with her thoughts. “Ok then, how about boxes?”

“Mew!” Mew cheered excitedly.

Vick beamed. “Guess all cats like boxes.”

“Mew!”

“Say…” Vicky grinned wider at Mew, who smiled innocently back. “How would you like to prank my family?”

“Mew!” The cat-like legendary spun around in a circle and immediately transitioned to zooming in dizzying spirals. Vicky laughed delightedly.

“Cats are the best, and you are awesome , this is going to be so much fun!”

“Mew!”

“Ok then, here’s my idea…”

Gram-gram looked down at the empty cardboard box in front of her.

Then up at the floating pink pokemon.

Then back down at the box.

Then to the letter lying open on the dining room table. 

Dear Gram-gram,

Before you freak out, yes this is a cat. Her name is Mew.

She likes organic pecha berries and pranks. I think she’d get along really well with Dratini, just don’t leave the two of them unsupervised for too long. Anyway, I hope you enjoy having another rare cat!

Love,

Vicky

Gram-gram looked up at her son’s fainted wife, and her son who seemed to be either nursing a stress migraine or doing a rather accurate impersonation of a golduck.

She looked back at Mew.

Gram-gram smiled. It was not a nice smile.

Mew smiled back. It was also not a nice smile.

“Oh, you and I are going to get along famously.”

From that moment on, maniacal cackles and chirp-like giggles that sounded strangely like a cat’s meowing resounded far into the night.

Agatha could safely say that she had absolutely NOT anticipated this ever happening to her in her entire life, no matter how long and decorated her tenure had been as part of the Elite Four.

She, along with her co-workers in the Elite Four and Champion Lance, stared at the woman in front of them.

Vicky’s Gram-gram sported a particularly satisfied smile as a light pink pokemon levitated around her head, giggling intermittently and bouncing on empty air. Agatha was fairly sure she had seen depictions of this pokemon before.

In ancient texts.

About the creation of the universe.

“I would like to register another cat companion for the Ferrous family, under non-battle pokemon, please,” Vicky’s Gram-gram repeated, raising a challenging eyebrow at the five of them.

Out of the corner of her eye, Agatha could see Lance’s eyebrow twitch.

Mewtwo stared intensely at Mew.

“Mew!” The pink creature chirped happily.

“Hey guys—” Vicky walked into the room and promptly stopped. “Uh. Am I interrupting something?”

“No.”

“Mew!”

Vicky blinked. Her thoughts visibly went through several permutations and calculations before finally landing on “not gonna question it.” Then her gaze landed on Mewtwo, which seemed to solidify her decision to put whatever was happening out of her head.

“Happy birthday!” She announced, and held out a lopsided but very long, and very fuzzy, purple scarf. It looked like an amateur job, with a couple of dropped stitches here and some extra there, just a little ugly but very, very soft.

“I don’t know if you have an actual birthday or anything — do you have an actual birthday? That would kind of embarrassing for me if you did, but please tell me—so I decided to just make today because why not, unless you want a different day. Do you want a different day? Oh shoot I should have asked—” She blinked a couple times to recollect herself then forged on ahead. “I don’t know if you get cold, but I thought you might like a scarf or something so I tried making it for you, Gram-gram was happy to teach me how to knit but I don’t think I’m very good at it—”

“I love it,” Mewtwo projected simply. He awkwardly reached his long neck over and nuzzled her cheek, ignoring her mental—and vocal—squeal of joy. He also decisively glossed over Mew’s happy chirps as the smaller legendary swished energetically around their heads.

Vicky eventually composed herself and consciously stopped her feet from doing a little happy dance. Her mental squealing seemed to die down, though it still hadn't stopped.

“Mom’s making dinner—” Mom said not to tell him it’s his favorite food, shoot should I be thinking about that right now, wait uh Mewtwo forget you heard that if you are in my head, and if you arent, uh— Mewtwo heard the tail end of her thoughts and something warm and fuzzy grew inside his chest.

The moment was broken by a happy “Mew!” as Mew somersaulted in mid-air. The tension immediately collapsed.

Vicky blinked and laughed. Slowly, she shuffled back towards the door, swinging it shut as she passed. Then she paused.

She glanced back into the room, then uncharacteristically ducked her head. “Oh, um… I don’t know what the argument was earlier, but I hope you know that we—and I—love you and always will. You’re our cat now, and we’re your human subjects, like Gram-gram says, so you’re stuck with us!”

Vicky immediately exited and closed the door. In the silence after her departure, Mewtwo could hear her steps bouncing down the hall and out towards the kitchen. He didn’t move a single inch, merely listening. Breathing.

There was a light bump on his shoulder as something nudged him. Mewtwo turned to stare.

“Mew!” I told you so. Mew stuck her tongue out.

Mewtwo just rolled his eyes and wrapped himself tighter in his scarf.

It was really warm.

Jessie, James, and Meowth all gulped in unison.

Mewtwo stared back impassively. 

James slid a single foot back, then froze as the pokemon’s eyes snapped to him.

“H-hello, Mr. Mewtwo, sir?” Jessie stuttered, fake cheer in her voice, “ho-how may we help y-you today?”

Unsaid was the fact that the last time they had seen Mewtwo, the pokemon was rather… gung-ho about not liking humanity. Truly, it was a complete mystery as to whatever gave them that impression—surely, it couldn’t have been the utter disdain at the sight of them and the twerps, or maybe the cloning machine and evil plot to become a trainer himself, or maybe the giant balls of psychic energy that the legendaries were throwing around like flipping cannonballs.

Oh, and the fact that back, then the three of them were definitely still criminals (now they were morally-grey at worst, James insisted) had most definitely attempted to run off with a couple of pokemon.

Whoops.

The trio gulped again.

Then Vicky careened into the room, grinning wildly and slightly out of breath, Arcanine slobbering happily behind her. She stopped. Blinked.

“Oh hey, guys!” Vicky cheerfully greeted them, “welcome back! How was the trip? Did you enjoy the beach in Cerulean? I hope you stayed out of trouble! Oh, right—” she turned to Mewtwo, whose expression was still impassive… had it softened a bit? No, that was ridiculous. This was the superpowered, insanely strong, terrifying monster of a pokemon that had threatened to destroy all of them the last time they had seen each other—

“We have indeed met,” Mewtwo commented.

Jessie, James, and Meowth startled and immediately stood at attention.

“Of course!”

“Indeed.”

“Aye, boss!”

Vicky just stared at them for a moment, before shrugging. “Cool!” She turned to Mewtwo. “Do you want to watch the next episode of that soap opera you were talking about? It’ll be on in like two minutes. Dinner’s in five,” she told the rest of the group. And yep, his eyes were definitely crinkled upwards. For the love of Ho-oh.

What on earth was Vicky Ferrous?

The human in question bounded out of the room with the cheerful obliviousness of a teenage girl, leaving behind a room in various states of stunned chaos, like a capricious eldritch god.

Jessie, James and Meowth glanced at each other.

Well, on the upside… they would definitely get the chance to see more crazy pokemon staying here at home here than they ever could while chasing after the other twerps.

Then they heard another sound.

“Mew!” A second pokemon of incomprehensible power—whom the trio had also last seen hurling lethal orbs of psychic energy willy-nilly in the same room as them—giggled as she bounced around their heads.

FOR THE LOVE OF—

Chapter Text

Later, Agatha would claim to have noticed her first: a skinny, dirty-blond fifteen year old girl dressed in practical, billowy trousers and blouse that were currently dripping wet, leaving a trail of damp splotches leading all the way back into the gym. She looked like a particularly pissed off, wet cat. The soggy Meowth next to her only completed the look.

Agatha could faintly hear the girl mutter something about a stupid Gyarados under her breath.

Agatha couldn’t help but smirk at her as she looked up, gaze darkening and ready to snap at whoever was in her way.

Heh. Defeated by a Gyarados? Lame, her smile seemed to say. The vein twitching in the girl’s forehead was remarkably refreshing.

“Shortstack,” the girl muttered. Next to her, the Meowth sniffed and turned away.

Her blood boiled, but Agatha restrained herself, and only huffed. Though she couldn’t stop herself from knocking against the girl’s shoulder as she entered the gym.

That bloody Gyarados should be banned from the circuit, Agatha fumed. 

She wrung out her dripping skit and stopped short.

The girl with the Meowth from before leaned against the side of the gym, smirking.

“Shortstack,” the girl smugly commented.

Oooh, she was going to pound this girl into the ground.

“Catface,” Agatha shot back.

The next thing she knew, Officer Jenny was pulling the two of them apart by the collar, her Growlithe partner barking like mad. Agatha’s own fingers continued to claw at the girl, who stared back with a haughty glare and her own curled fists drawn back as if to punch.

After a brief moment of continued struggle, both girls mulishly fell silent and withstood the severe scolding from Officer Jenny… who dropped both of them off at the Pokemon Center, where they withstood yet another severe scolding from the Nurse Joy on duty.

Apparently, the girl’s name was Anastasia Ferrous. Her family bred Meowth for generations.

“Spoiled brat,” Agatha grumbled under her breath.

Anastasia glared at her. “Creepy jerk.”

Nurse Joy immediately smacked both of them with the back of her clipboard and launched into yet another sermon on decency and polite behavior.

Both girls huffed in sync, then turned to glare at each other, then huffed again and turned their heads away in unison.

Agatha’s frown deepened as she noticed this stupid girl copying her actions.

Oh, it was on.

Anastasia laughed evilly. “Still sticking with creepy ghosts?”

Agatha just cackled back, incensed. “Still a scaredy cat?”

Officer Jenny arrived just in time to break up another fistfight. Though not quite soon enough to prevent the destruction of several roadside planters.

Anastasia Ferrous had evolved her Meowth into a Persian.

Damn catface.

Agatha might have found it in her cold, ghostly heart to be happy for her… if the first thing the girl had done hadn’t been to call for a Pokemon battle and trash Agatha’s pokemon with her evolved ‘mon.

Agatha growled to herself.

Two weeks later, Ghastly had become Gengar, and Agatha got her sweet, sweet revenge.

Four and a half months into their journey, Anastasia received the Vermillion gym badge before Agatha, and refused to let the latter forget it.

One month, uncountable training bruises, several punched trees, and a lot of teeth-gritting later, Agatha cackled in superiority as she flashed the Celadon badge at a highly irritated Anastasia, her Persian growling at her side.

The ensuing fistfight left both of them more bruised than they had ever gotten during training, huffing and mutually ignoring both each other and the rather harried Nurse Joy who had been sent to tend to their scratches.

Agatha watched from the side of the room in the Pokemon Center as Ana carefully cradled a mewling, squirming ball of scruff, murmuring encouragement to the Persian in the center as the cat struggled to birth another kit. Agatha was personally squicked out, but Ana was enthralled. She loved cats, and her eyes sparkled at the magic of the moment as the Persian hissed and yowled, and the tiny kittens cried out in tiny mewls as they stumbled towards their mother. Ana was enamored, just as much as Agatha adored her ghosts.

It had been around one and a half years since they had first set out on their Journey. Such a long time, and yet it still felt short to Agatha. She and Ana had both managed to complete all eight gyms, with the full badge cases to prove it. Agatha even had two star badges!

A vein had pulsed in Ana’s forehead at her achievement barely six months into their Journey, and Agatha had crowed in superiority at the sight. At the second, just two weeks ago, Ana had sincerely congratulated her.

She wasn’t sure when that shift in their relationship had happened. Probably sometime between spitting out “Anastasia” like a curse and realizing that she now called her rival “Ana” with a definitely-not-fond smirk.

Neither of them was entirely sure who had received the last Viridian badge first. They had run into each other, and it seemed they both tacitly agreed not to ask.

The sun was inching slowly towards the horizon as the two girls left the Pokemon center. It was not yet time for sunset, but the clouds seemed to stretch out in anticipation, just barely tinged orange in the late afternoon light. Agatha breathed in the warm breeze, a lazy summer puff of air that did barely anything to undercut the heavy heat.

At her side, Anastasia’s expression was uncharacteristically thoughtful.

It was kind of nice to walk side by side despite their entire relationship being composed of challenges and near-fistfights. Agatha was fairly sure that by this point most of the Jennies had a notice to be on the lookout for the two girls.

“I think…” Ana began after they had walked a moment in uncharacteristic silence, “I want to take over my family’s cat-breeding business.”

“What?” Agatha blinked, taken aback. “Why?”

Ana just looked at her, a sardonic tilt to her brow that spoke volumes that Agatha didn’t want to read. “I’ve been falling behind, and I know that—”

“Hey, you just—”

“Shut up, shortstack.”

Agatha snapped her mouth shut mulishly.

Ana just rolled her eyes at the display. “I know I’m not good enough to make it beyond the qualifiers—you know that too, stop denying it.” She slapped a hand on Agatha’s mouth as the latter glared at her. “You’ve trashed me every time we fought, and I don’t have a clear path to get any better than I am right now. My heart’s not in it. Besides, I don’t think being a professional trainer is for me. That right there—” Anastasia nodded her chin at the kitten being nudged by the mother Persian. “That’s what I want to do.” She turns back to Agatha. “So you win it for both of us, right?”

Agatha stared at her in silence for a moment, before Ana seemed to remember herself and removed the hand covering Agatha’s mouth. Agatha’s mouth curved down into a severe frown, but Ana continued to wait.

Finally, Agatha scoffed. “I’ll win it for myself, thank you very much.”

Ana laughed. “Sure, you do that.”

Agatha chuckled with her in response. Despite the light mood, and the joy of seeing her frie— rival find what she wanted to do (what lit a fire in Ana just like how the thought of standing in the arena shouting commands to her pokemon, working together with them to take down the opponent, outthink them, leave them stunned and gaping in her wake sent a thrill of anticipation through Agatha) she couldn’t help but feel a pang of… disappointment? Loss?

Agatha quickly tried to school her face into a carefree grin, but something must have slipped through, because now Ana was glaring at her. And then Ana promptly punched her in the shoulder.

“Ow!” Agatha whipped her head up. “Hey! You crazy—”

“Oi!” Ana interrupted her, leaving Agatha standing with her mouth gaping open and completely offended, “you had better not lose! If you do, I’m gonna punt your ass six ways to Sunday!”

“As if your scaredy cats manage to get that far—” Agatha replied automatically. And snapped her mouth shut. Then after a moment of gaping (“like a fish, shortstack,” she barely heard Ana mutter), Agatha huffed. Despite all efforts to the contrary, a rueful smile grew on her face. She glanced down for a moment, then looked back up and stared intently at Ana, who matched her gaze with an equally piercing one of her own.

Birds-damned Ana.

“Just you wait, catface, I’m gonna win the Conference and make it to the Elite Four!” Agatha growled, pointing a finger at her.

Ana just cackled loudly, and a split-second later, Agatha joined in.

This time, when they parted, Agatha didn’t immediately feel the need to punch something, just the fierce, burning urge to decimate everyone in the League.

Watch out, Elite 4, I’m coming for you.

Agatha was practically vibrating as she stalked forward into the arena. The glaring lights, the glitz, glamour, and dazzle of the stadium, the roar of the crowd, the fast-paced speech of the announcers running through their words like it was food to starving men—this, this was where she belonged. She was here, and she and her ghosts would show them all.

Her palms slicked with sweat. Her fingers twitched, from nerves or excitement Agatha couldn’t say. A non stop thrill ran up and down her spine, diving down into her stomach and spinning in dizzying circles. She felt light as air, yet shaking like a leaf. At her side, she could faintly sense a hum from her pokeballs, and muted excitement from Gengar, glaring out at the stands from her shadow. The large stadium light fell on her shape, and she wondered just how many would notice that her shadow was slightly darker than it should be.

It was like this every time, every match, every battle. And she would get better, over and over again.

She was a Pokemon Trainer, after all, and proud of it.

Agatha’s eyes roamed over the stands, idly cataloging faces.

She froze.

Anastasia Ferrous was right there on the lower stands. Her arms were crossed in haughty annoyance, and she stared imperiously down at the arena, a cold expression on her face. In a split-second, Ana’s eyes found hers, and their gazes locked.

Ana raised an eyebrow and mouthed some words. After a moment of squinting, Agatha could finally make the message out.

‘You had better win, shortstack.’

Agatha bristled, ready to fire back with an insult despite Ana not being able to hear her, so far away in the stands, and with the whole world watching— then she caught Ana’s signature grin. At one time, Agatha had thought it was smug; she had seen it as Ana laughing at her, at her losses, at her efforts, in all of their moments of rivalry. But over time, that had changed. It was an insider’s grin, a smile that promised chaos, a smirk that knew better than to proclaim happiness to the world because it knew that this vindictive joy was due only to a few close friends. It was Ana’s grin, Agatha’s grin, the grin that made the two of them immediately butt heads and leave officer Jenny scolding them in the rubble.

Agatha began to smile back.

They were not nice grins: they were ghost grins and cat grins, all unsettling teeth and unnaturally wide lips and vicious, vindictive surety.

Agatha could tell that it was unsettling for the vast majority of the audience, watching up there on the big projected screen, to see just how far her teeth could go. But Ana just grinned back from her place in the stands, like a cat that caught the pidgey.

Oh yeah, Agatha thought, I’m going to trash this league.

Agatha stared at the letter on the desk.

The address of the Ferrous residence seemed to taunt her. Agatha scoffed and immediately tore it open.

An explosion of cat hair burst out from the envelope, sending her reeling back and coughing.

“BIRDS-DAMN YOU, ANA—” Agatha wheezed. Bearily, she glanced at the small piece of cardstock that accompanied the surprise cat-hair-glitter-bomb.

CONGRATS, SHORTSTACK, HERE’S SOME CAT HAIR FOR YOUR FANCY SCHMANCY OFFICE!

And further down, in smaller script: I told you so! -Ana

Agatha idly wondered if she could send one of her younger Ghastly to go prank Ana’s house. Not for too long. Maybe just a month? A year? Hmm. Food for thought.

Agatha slammed the ward door open and swept into the room, taking stock of the space. Her gaze immediately fell on Ana, lying tiredly slumped on the hospital bed, covered in sweat and hospital garb and cradling a small bundle to her chest.

The cooing Agatha had head from behind the closed door immediately stopped as Ana whipped her head up to stare at her. 

“Heard someone had a baby!” Agatha crowed with glee.

“Shut up, Agatha, or so help me Arceus,” Ana growled, clutching her child in the bundle.

The venomous look she shot Agatha intimidated even the Ghost Master into quickly backing out of the room.

Ana often didn’t quite know whether she wanted to strangle her erstwhile rival or thank her repeatedly for her presence.

Maybe both?

Suffice it to say, Agatha was a wonderful option to pawn off her son to when he was going through his troublesome teenage phase.

‘It’s not a phase, Mom,” her whiskered ass.

And then he brought home a girlfriend. Ho-oh give her strength.

Hey Agatha,
Some greedy League idiots are pissing us off for the Milotic, that I’m sure you and your spy network of ghosts have heard all about already. Come on over before I punt them into the sun.
-Ana

Ana,
Care to tell me how in the BIRDS’ NAME you have a flock of Milotic?
-Agatha

Blame my granddaughter. She sure doesn’t get it from me.
-Ana

Ana, she ABSOLUTELY gets it from you.
-Agatha

Ana’s granddaughter was just as gloriously chaotic as Ana in her prime.

Good - she had been worried when the gene missed a generation. Maybe it was only active in the girls?

Ana would absolutely start a fistfight if she knew what Agatha was thinking, regardless of her old age.

Heh. Catface.

Well, the little Victoria “Call Me Vicky” Ferrous had all the hallmarks of being Ana’s granddaughter: the insistence upon using a shortened version of her name, the chaotic cackles, the wild urge to run off in various directions, the obsession with pokemon (though it had been cats and cats alone for Ana), and her sheer propensity for chaos.

Agatha was looking forward to this.

She heard a knock on the office door, and opened it to see Ana’s grinning face.

Agatha began grinning as well.

In the next room over, Lance gulped as the unfamiliar old lady’s ominous giggles and Agatha’s signature cackles filled the air.

Chapter Text

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Don’t Ask
Hey, I finally have a full team! Currently building a second line. You can clearly see which one is Gible’s, LOL

[Photo: a line of seven pokeballs, all pure white with a red strip horizontally across the middle, sitting on what looks to be a dusty cave floor. The rightmost premium ball displays several dried, suspiciously rust-red splatters on the bright white of the ball, some of which look uncomfortably like fingerprints.]
Comments 18.7k | Likes 23.1k | Rechirps 21.1k

@MysticWarpGengar_666 Heyy, congrats!

— @ZapThunderZubat_555 did you notice…?

— @rhyhornrumble_44 @ZapThunderZubat_555 ye probably but shhh no one’s gonna bring it up

@PsyWaveEevee_199 Full team yooo!

@wooperwhirl_888 Um. Uh. Uhhhhh… *stares at last pokeball in image*

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 lol I thought everyone was just ignoring that

— @jigglypuffpulse XD

— @HydroVortexBlast_987 same

— @PokeMystic_23 suspenseful music intensifies

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Better I want to be annoyed at you. At the same time, what the Distortion are you doing, Vicky???

— ✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Don’t Ask LOL big chomper

— @ThunderPichu_007 …

— @LeafBurstVenus_143 wtf

— @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Better ?????

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@SolarShockFlare_888 I don’t know if I should be congratulating her or asking after her sanity

— @BlazinChar_1234 Both. Both is good.

— @MysticLeafLeafeon_111 Same

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 IS THAT BLOOD???

@PsySprintKadabra_321 All of a sudden I am feeling… less enthusiastic about my wild plans to explore out of the region

@ZubatZoomer_11 Anyone who knows IronVictory in person, could you please check that she’s ok?

— @MysticWarpGengar_666 ^

— @EeveeEnigma_96 ^ this

— @PsyduckPulse23 seconded

— @meowthmelody88 aye

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@VortexVineVileplume_275 LOL someone @ the Parents pls

@BulbaBuddy_567 WHAT (very concerned)

— @JoltiXer_242 w h a t

— @jigglypuffpulse yes

— @ZubatZoomer_11 good to see ya, buddy

— @rhyhornrumble_44 s a m e

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@ElectricZapster @creepingivy @spiritpuppy132 I don’t know if I want to @ The Parents on here but hopefully someone will give us an explanation

— @EeveeEnigma_96 thank you

— @ZubatZoomer_11 Doing the Birds’ work here

— @ElectricZapster What happened, please???

— @creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy I have a policy: don’t ask questions you do not want to know the answers to. I do not want to know the answer to this one, therefore I have not asked her this question and probably will not in the future.

— @creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy That being said, @westpeninsulaarcaninetrainer Mr. and Mrs. Ferrous, please do check in with Vicky before she gets herself killed.

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@PsyduckPulse23 Based on context clues, Vicky’s propensity and enthusiasm for attracting dangerous Pokemon, and the fact that Vicky has a Gible, I think there’s a fairly obvious conclusion to draw here. Doesn’t make me any less Concerned, but still.

@JynxJive_789 Ok seriously wtf, is that BLOOD ON THAT LAST ONE

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Dancing Queen
I just crushed this man’s dreams and ruined his career. On the plus side, if there is a dragon dance-off, I can now officially say that I would WIN
Comments 19.8k | Likes 22.2k | Rechirps 21k

@BulbaBuddy_567 what

— @MoonFrostJynx_456 wHAt

— @jigglypuffpulse wat

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@rhyhornrumble_44 all hail the cryptid

@AeroSlashDragon_321 DRAGON DANCE-OFF????

@AquaRush_2000 F in chat to whatever poor soul met her in person

— @ZubatZoomer_11 F

— @VortexVineVileplume_275 Ffffff

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 RIP

— @JoltiXer_242 f

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@EeveeEnigma_96 Ok poor guy and all that, but is anyone else intensely curious about a DRAGON DANCE OFF???

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@FrostBlastGlalie_275 Someone @ Lance

— @AeroSlashDragon_321 Oh my Birds PLEASE

— @JoltiXer_242 LANCE GIVE US A DRAGON DANCE PARTY

— @rhyhornrumble_44 ok but imagine lance’s dragonite synchronized swimming

— @SolarShockFlare_888 AERIAL DRAGON PERFORMANCES

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 LOL like Blackthorn would let us

— @VortexVineVileplume_275 but THINK ABOUT IT - IronVictory + Lance battle but DANCE STYLE

— @ZapThunderZubat_555 YOOOO

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@CharmanderCharm Dear, please do continue! I would love to see some videos - and perhaps bring back the Contest scene to Kanto!

— @BlazinChar_1234 Contests?

— @EeveeEnigma_96 oooh that sounds fun!

— @psyKickachu wat r even contests

— @wooperwhirl_888 Oh my gosh I love those! So sad Kanto doesn’t have any…

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@PokeMystic_23 Wait, is it a dragon dancing? A Dragon Dance? Several Dragon Dancing dragons? A group of dancing dragons??? What is happening???

— @MarillMuse_444 You know, I was pretty sure in my head, and then I read this and am now more confused than I started.

@ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 posts like these are why I follow this lady. just… drop a line and leave everyone screaming. its wonderful

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy … Vicky??? What did you do in the last LITERALLY 15 MINUTES

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Dancing Queen
Guess who’s BACK???
Comments 15.6k | Likes 23.5k | Rechirps 24.3k

@jigglypuffpulse run for the hills

@BulbaBuddy_567 Oh Birds

— @HydroVortexBlast_987 relatable

— @ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 THE CHAIN HAS BEEN BROKEN! ‘TIS AN OMEN, GOOD FOLK! FLEE!

— @meowthmelody88 no what???

— @BulbaBuddy_567 @meowthmelody88 I felt like this was a suitably ominous location to break the pattern

— @PikAurora_151 f e a r

— @MarillMuse_444 @BulbaBuddy_567 you know, you can be a heck of a chaotic troll sometimes. And I only just noticed.

— @BulbaBuddy_567 @MarillMuse_444 :P

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@CharmanderCharm Welcome back to Kanto!

@SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 Ho-Oh help us all

— @PokeMystic_23 *raspy voice* where are your gods now, feeble mortals?

@MoonFrostJynx_456 Oh, so THAT’S why I saw a supersonic dragonite when I looked up this afternoon

— @ThunderPichu_007 wtf

— @VortexVineVileplume_275 wait where do you live, and can we move there for Vicky sightings

— @LeafBurstVenus_143 What is this, a wild bird-watching club?

— @PikAurora_151 @LeafBurstVenus_143 it’s vicky, close enough

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@ThunderQuakeOnix_007 isn’t this a little too dramatic?

— @PsyduckPulse23 You sweet summer child

— @ZubatZoomer_11 nope

— @JoltiXer_242 haha

— @AeroSlashDragon_321 no

— @PsyWaveEevee_199 it’s exactly as dramatic as it needs to be

— @ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 No

— @rhyhornrumble_44 honestly I’m surprised the world isn’t on fire

— @ThunderQuakeOnix_007 ooookaaaay…

— @PsyduckPulse23 @ThunderQuakeOnix_007 first time in the fandom?

— @JoltiXer_242 LOL

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@JynxJive_789  Did anyone see a flying Gyarados? No? Just me?

@spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Better VICKY I’M GONNA CHALLENGE YOU TO A POKEMON BATTLE AS SOON AS WE SEE EACH OTHER-

— @PikAurora_151 F

— @ZubatZoomer_11 everyone, a moment of silence for our friend Kiba

— @FrostBlastGlalie_275 RIP

— @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Better Oi-

— [ Click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | I Have Returned to Spread Chaos
League researchers are stupid
Comments 18.4k | Likes 16.7k | Rechirps 14.5k

@creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy Look. All I’m gonna say is that they deserved that.

— @AquaAeroSeadra_555 f e a r

— @ZapThunderZubat_555 mom I’m scared

— @AquaRush_2000 What happened????

— @wooperwhirl_888 Look, if even CREEPINGIVY - the technically sane one - is saying that, then you know someone is going to be in DEEP trouble.

— @PsyduckPulse23 @wooperwhirl_888 I’m fairly sure you were about to say a different word at the end there

— [ Click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | I Have Returned to Spread Chaos
HEY BUDDY WHEN I SAID  “DON’T LOOK UNDER THERE ON PAIN OF DEATH,” THAT WASN’T A THREAT OR A JOKE. I’M SERIOUS.
In other news, Indigo Research Center is now in need of one (1) new research assistant, please send all inquiries and applications to @indigoplateuresearchofficial
Comments 20.1k | Likes 22.5k | Rechirps 23.4k

@BulbaBuddy_567 WWWW HHHH AAAA TTTT

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 me too buddy, me too

— @JoltiXer_242 f e a r

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@MysticWarpGengar_666 Dude

@ThunderPichu_007 lol imma apply

@ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 The chaos spreads. I wish to know the name of our new compatriot of darkness

— @BlazinChar_1234 It’s probably the ghost

— @FrostBlastGlalie_275 ghost?

— @PikAurora_151 @FrostBlastGlalie_275 ye the creepy one with dark tentacles

— @BlazinChar_1234 photo in post here

— @MoonFrostJynx_456 it’s kinda cute tbh

— @ThunderQuakeOnix_007 wtf

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 Uh. What exactly do I react with?

— @PokeMystic_23 An application letter

@ElectricZapster Alright folks, contingency 21 for murder, unsure of culpability.

— @rhyhornrumble_44 aye captain

— @EeveeEnigma_96 Got it, boss!

— @HydroVortexBlast_987 wtf

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@AquaRush_2000 Worst case scenario, Chansey is God and Chansey cures all

@MarillMuse_444 Anyone else seriously thinking of applying?

— @JynxJive_789 THAT’S what you’re asking???

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@GengarRules_000 | Agatha E4 not to fear, my dear, it will soon work out

— @BlazinChar_1234 The Queen returns!

— @PsyWaveEevee_199 AGATHA!

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 ominous

— @DragonTwistite_42 oh my gosh, what is an E4 doing here-

— @ZapThunderZubat_555 @DragonTwistite_42 first time?

— @DragonTwistite_42 @ZapThunderZubat_555 This has happened BEFORE???

— [ Click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | I Have Returned to Spread Chaos
Update: Agatha rocks.
Comments 15.1k | Likes 21.3k | Rechirps 19.8k

@meowthmelody88 Okay, so it’s definitely the ghost

— @wooperwhirl_888 You know, knowing that doesn’t make me feel any better

— @AquaAeroSeadra_555 Lol

— [ Click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy
Sometimes people ask me why I’m friends with Vicky. I usually just reply that it builds character.

[Video: As the video begins playing, the camera is shaky, and the viewer can faintly see a large, indoor space that looks like a ballroom, complete with towering columns, gleaming stained glass, and tall arches, with league-standard battlefield markings drawn down on the polished marble floor. Suddenly, a very familiar figure, adorned with her signature straw hat and flannels, stomps into the camera frame from the right side, moving quickly towards the center of the arena, and whoever is recording seems to jog to catch up.
“Vicky, can we just—” A voice—which some viewers identified as Ivy—cries in a despairing tone of voice from behind the camera. Vicky doesn’t seem to acknowledge the plea.
As we get closer, a figure becomes clear in the center, easily recognizable as Lance Blackthorn. Suddenly, the girl in the straw hat shouts, and the camera person startles, evident in a jolt of the camera.
“THIS!” Vicky shoves what looks like a ball of wiggling goop in Lance’s face. The Champion takes a couple steps back, bewildered. “THIS IS A PURE DRAGON!”
Lance stares at her, then at the mass of sentient slime in her hands. “... What.”
“BEHOLD AND BE AWED BY GOOMY’S GREATNESS, YOU PEASANT—”
From behind the camera, Ivy just groans.
“Miss Ferrous,” Lance sighs, “this is a Blackthorn private property, I will ask for you to please follow security off the premises—”
Suddenly, a door at the other end of the hall slams open. “VICTORIA FERROUS, PLEASE COOPERATE OR—”
“Oh Birds,” sharp-eared viewers can faintly hear Ivy mutter.
“NEVER!” The straw-hatted girl hollers, even as Lance slaps his forehead with his palm and looks to all the world like he would rather be anywhere but here. “THIS IS CENSORSHIP! FREE THE PRESS! LET DRAGONS BE KNOWN! PRAISE THE PURE DRAGON TYPE! The world must KNOOOooooo…”
The camera follows as Vicky is gently but firmly escorted out of the room by security, and the door swings shut.
Someone to the left of the camera coughs. The view swings around to Lance Blackthorn raising an unimpressed eyebrow to the person behind the camera.
“Don’t look at me.” Ivy’s voice is dry as the desert of the Safari Zone. “you try saying no to her. I’ll just take my exit now, no need for security.”
The video ends.]
Comments 9.5k | Likes 11.1k | Rechirps 12.9k

@BulbaBuddy_567 What.

— @meowthmelody88 oh no, it’s capitalized

— @jigglypuffpulse whAt

— @FrostBlastGlalie_275 yeah, I feel that

— @PsyduckPulse23 WhAt

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@MoonFrostJynx_456 THAT IS SO CUTE

@LeafBurstVenus_143 Hey I recognize those guys from that one video! So squishy

— @PsyWaveEevee_199 ye the squishy ones

@DragonTwistite_42 They’re dragon typed???

— @BlazinChar_1234 I mean, if you’re going with what IronVictory said

— @AquaRush_2000 maybe???

— @MarillMuse_444 At this point the debate is pretty firmly contested between water, grass, poison, or normal, so sure, why not add dragon to the mix?

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@ElectricZapster Hello everyone! Please see the following link for Lance Blackthorn’s official statement on this incident… [Click to expand]

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@wooperwhirl_888 You know what I find absolutely hilarious? How all of us are just accepting the fact that Vicky broke into what looks like a secure Blackthorn training ground, with a friend, while recording, with a giant slime, and focusing on the slime she proceeded to shove in the current Champion’s face

— @ZubatZoomer_11 I mean, that’s Vicky

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 LOL

— @EeveeEnigma_96 Welcome to the IronVictory fandom

— @PsyduckPulse23 I… I am in need of some serious self-reflection

— @jigglypuffpulse XD

— @rhyhornrumble_44 you know, when you put it that way…

— @ElectricZapster Honestly? At this point we’re basically expecting this from Vicky

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@IronVictory14 | League Researchers Are Stupid HEY! Nice vid tho

— @SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 what on earth possessed you to do this

— @rhyhornrumble_44 the woman, the myth, the legend

— @IceSlashWeavile_314 THAT’S your only reaction???

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@westkantoresearchofficial | Viridian Research Station We are unsure of Trainer Ferrous’s claims of Goomy’s pure dragon typing, but the topic is currently under investigation. Research stations will be reaching out to the Ferrous residence soon to study their puddle.

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 Lol not @indigoplateuresearchofficial though

— @EeveeEnigma_96 Either way, I am Intrigued.

— @rhyhornrumble_44 good timing, the typing debate is getting pretty heated on the fanpage and I was getting tired of moderating the comments

— @PsyWaveEevee_199 Woah that was fast

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@VoltMagnetJolt_314 A friendly reminder to everyone here that there are actual fines for trespassing. And probably a couple more for harassing a League official (for which Lance Blackthorn definitely qualifies) that IronVictory is probably only not getting due to… [ Click to expand ]

— [ Click to see more replies ]

Chapter Text

“Victoria Ferrous? Might I inquire, what exactly are you doing?”

Vicky startled and snapped her head up from where she had been furiously typing on her parents’ clunky old computer. She really, really missed the laptops of her old world… but honestly, this world had POKEMON ! There was no flipping way she was giving that up, not even for a laptop with seamless wifi connection.

Besides, give it two years, and she was sure SilphCo would come up with something similar, at the rate they were going.

Vicky blinked and refocused on Mewtwo, who had just spoken and was now standing patiently, if a little befuddled, in the doorway to the living room.

“Sorry, could you repeat that?” she asked.

Mewtwo raised an eyebrow—how did he do that? Did he even have eyebrows? Focus Vicky—and gestured to her… everything.

Vicky tilted her head. She had scrounged about in her closet for the darkest clothes she owned, and was now sporting a mystifying combination of yoga leggings, a cheap graphic T-shirt one size too large with the words “Keep Calm and Umbre-On,” and a ratty black sweatshirt with a promotion for the fortune-telling shop two streets down that Mewtwo knew from his research into Victoria’s hometown—which she firmly insisted was now his hometown, too, and he noticeably never bothered to correct her—had gone out of business three years ago. Her feet were swamped in obscenely large, fuzzy black socks that made almost no noise on the wooden floors of the house. She had also tied a black handkerchief to her face in a rather unimpressive imitation of a ski mask.

All in all, she looked like a half-hearted attempt at a child’s Halloween costume that had outgrown its usefulness and was now falling apart at the seams.

A fitting metaphor for Mewtwo’s sanity the longer he stayed around this absurd household.

Also, it was three AM.

“Do you have a reason for skulking in your family’s living room dressed as a sorry attempt at a homeless thief, or am I to assume that you have finally lost your marbles and are looking for them under the floorboards?”

Vicky decided to ignore his question in favor of the sensation of pride practically bursting from her chest: “Oh my gosh, Mewtwo, you’re learning sarcasm! I’m so proud! Keep it up!” She gave him a joyful thumbs up.

It was not very effective.

“Your friend Vinewood taught me that phrase. She mentioned that I would get a lot of use out of it around you. She seems to be correct.”

“Her name’s Ivy. I-V-Y.”

Mewtwo simply raised a nonexistent eyebrow. It was a remarkably emotive expression for the normally stoic-faced pokemon… even if that emotion was pure disdain.

Vicky was so proud.

“I,” she declared with a threatening finger pointed directly at his chest, “am getting you professorship status!”

Silence.

Mewtwo stared at her.

“... Pardon?”

“Professor Mewtwo!”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“No— I am not engaging in this foolishness with you.”

Vicky grinned. “Does that mean I can go ahead and do it?”

Mewtwo suddenly felt the onset of a headache. “You will proceed with this no matter what I say to convince you, correct?”

“Pretty much!” She grinned and bounced on her feet. “You don’t necessarily have to use it, though.”

“Alright, fine, but why me? Why not Meowth, for example?”

Vicky paused.

Mewtwo visibly did a double take. “Wait, Victoria—”

“That’s genius,” she whispered.

Mewtwo held out a paw. “Victoria, I did not—”

“I could make all of the cats professors, then no one will be able to talk down to them—”

Mewtwo was beginning to see flashes of his doom. “Let us think about this for a moment—”

“Thank you!” Vicky spun around, grasped a bewildered and gradually more and more horrified Mewtwo by the shoulders, gave him the brightest grin, then ran off into the sunset, Mewtwo staring off after her with an odd shudder of foreboding.

“Miss Vinewood?”

“Wh— Aaaah!” Ivy jumped several feet in the air. Her hand flew to her chest in shock. “Oh. Of course. Right, you’re one of Vicky’s…”

“My apologies, I did not mean to startle you,” Mewtwo said calmly, floating in the air.

“No, no, it’s fine. I should have expected that.” Ivy blinked several times. “Um. … what’s up?”

Mewtwo frowned. “I may be in need of assistance.”

Ivy tensed. “Uh… if this is some legendary thing, then I’m going to say I’m definitely not the person to ask—”

“It’s about Victoria.”

“Oh.” Ivy tilted her head. “…that’s either better or worse than a legendary end of the world. Still trying to figure out which. I can try?”

“She intends to make her cats professors. Myself included.”

Ivy stared for a long moment in silence. Then stared some more.

Then she broke out into hysterical giggles.

“Miss Vinewood,” Mewtwo sighed, attempting to steer her back on track, in vain. The cackles continued.

Eventually, they subsided into a faint wheezing, before Ivy took a deep breath, straightened back up from where she had been bent over, and glanced at him again. She snorted, just barely refraining from setting off another round of hysterical laughter. 

“That,” she declared, “is absolute gold. I wish you all the luck. Oh my gosh…”

“How about talking Victoria out of it—”

“Nope. Not happening. I made the mistake once to get in the way of Vicky’s insane plans. It ended with fifteen wild cats following us for a week as some kind of imperial honor guard, plus several Mankey in the trees. Never. Again.” Ivy cackled briefly.

“You’re just going to have to live with it, my dude.”

She strode off, desperately suppressing the giggles in her chest, leaving behind a befuddled Mewtwo murmuring, “‘my dude’?” under his breath.

The front door to the house blasted open as Victoria Ferrous leaped, cartoon-ninja style, into the living, room, landing in front of Mewtwo with a roll and promptly slapping something down onto the coffee table in front of him, ignoring her mother’s scandalized shout of “Vicky!” from the other room. Vicky was grinning widely, her eyes sparkling in triumph.

Mewtwo cautiously looked down. 

The small object sitting on the table was a small plastic rectangle about the size of an index card, with rounded corners and a gleam of light that indicated that it was laminated. There was a bit of text scrawled across the front. Mewtwo leaned in to take a closer look.

MEWTWO FERROUS
PROFESSOR OF POKEMON PHYSIOLOGY AND PSYCHOLOGY
This ID serves as an entrance ticket to official Pokemon conferences.
Please show your ID at the door. 

What.

There was a portrait picture of him on the left hand corner. Mewtwo vaguely remembered sitting still while Victoria was taking a photo about a week ago, brushing it off as just another strange plan of hers.

He probably should have paid it more attention.

What.

He abruptly shook off his shock, tuning back into the sounds of the living room around him. Victoria Ferrous was apparently in the middle of speaking.

“—it was a bit of a struggle to get those old fossils to approve it, which is ridiculous! I mean, come on, you made clone machines! How awesome is that?? That’s like decades ahead of all the current technology, you’re a freaking genius—”

Mewtwo could do nothing but blink as he was assaulted by a sudden word vomit. He really, really wanted to ask questions. At the same time, he really, really did not.

“—but I talked to Gram-gram about it and then they were super accommodating! Gram-gram is the best—”

The old lady in question just grinned evilly in the corner. Mewtwo gave her a wary, bewildered glance.

“—so now you can go to conferences!!! Also—”

Another WHAM! and a pile of papers was slammed into the table. The title read: ADOPTION FORM 3-P. Victoria Ferrous’s grin was blindingly wide. Mewtwo stared at it, entirely off-balance.

“Since you have an ID now, you can get adopted!!!”

Mewtwo stayed silent for several moments, stunned. Victoria seemed content to wait, bouncing slightly on the balls of her feet, energy and excitement and scheming glee oozing from every pore of her being. Mewtwo could faintly hear the “gram-gram”’s quiet cackles that had not yet abated.

“Was this your goal from the beginning, girl?” The “Gram-gram” asked.

Vicky whirled around to face the old lady, puffing up her chest in offense. “No way! My best cat deserves a PhD!”

“But you’re not even going to deny that it was a part of that decision?”

“I mean, yeah.” Vicky shrugged. It looked more like a full-body bounce, with the amount of energy contained in her. “Now I just gotta go make it official!”

And with that, she swept out of the room like a hurricane, leaving a laminated ID card, a stack of adoption papers, and utter chaos in her wake. Mewtwo was left staring at the wall. He was doing that a lot these days.

He could probably write a research paper on that. Something like “The Vicky Effect…” Goddammit. He was not actually thinking of becoming a Pokemon Professor. He was not. Absolutely not. Nope.

… Dammit.

He needed to leave this room before he did something he would regret.

Mewtwo stoically ignored the laminated ID and the stack of papers that he absently swept with him to go upstairs.

Not five minutes later, the door to his room swung cheerfully open, and Meowth strutted in, chest puffed in self-importance and grinning from ear to ear.

Around his neck, a laminated ID card attached to a small, Pokemon-sized lanyard read, “Professor Meowth, PhD in Pokemon Communication.”

Mewtwo wanted to scream. And then Mew floated in, bouncing on invisible bubbles in the air, stopping right in front of him with a tiny, cheerful barrel roll into a flick of her tail.

She also had a tiny laminated ID on a lanyard around her neck. Mew Ferrous was now apparently a Research Assistant to a “Dr. Meowth.”

Mewtwo stared.

How in the Giratina-damned Distortion did Victoria Ferrous convince Mew—MEW!—to take an official position??

Mewtwo didn’t even want to comment. Luckily, Mew decided to just answer all his questions without bothering to wait for him to ask them. 

<Nah, I dont’t want an official position.> Mew’s face scrunched up in disgust. <Too much stuff to do! I don’t wanna!>

“Then why do ya have a research position then?” Meowth frowned.

<Oh! Easy!> Mew giggled. <Vicky said I’ll be able to surprise people if I go to conferences! And this way I don’t have to sneak in! Oooh, maybe I can give those old fogeys heart attacks…>

Mewtwo once more reaffirmed his belief that Victoria Ferrous was a dangerous individual. Arceus help them all.

“And you?” Mewtwo turned to the smaller non-legendary.

“The girlie said that people at those events have a lotta money,” Meowth chuckled, “it’ll be great to scam—er, make—a lot of money for ourselves, too! Plus, my humans need to be able to get more places and be ready for anything. I’m the best part of the team!”

Mewtwo was struck with a sudden urge to bash his head against the wall.

<Plus, imagine Giovanni’s face when we enter,> Mew giggled once more.

He paused.

Mewtwo couldn’t deny that made a very convincing argument.

He glanced speculatively at his own laminated name card, still resting on the table from where Victoria had slapped it onto the surface and run off.

Months later, Mewtwo was only barely surprised to run into Dr. Meowth and Assistant Mew at the first eminent research conference of the season.

They stared at each other for a moment.

Mew giggled first, and bounced, spinning in the air. Meowth just gave a rakish grin. Mewtwo hoped his impending headache wasn’t showing.

“It’s been fun!” Meowth cackled, drawing a couple of wary glances from some people around.

There was a large empty space around the three pokemon and the rest of the eminent researchers that none seemed brave enough to breach. They only continued sending the trio incredibly strange looks. A couple of people had actually fainted. He kept hearing cut-off screams out of the corner of his eye.

“It has been quite amusing,” Mewtwo admitted. It had, in fact, been cathartic to watch the snobs’ faces at being shown up by a pokemon.

Giovanni’s face… Oh that man’s face had been priceless. Mewtwo took vicious pleasure in making him faint.

“Victoria is attempting to convince me to give a talk on cloning and pokemon behavior,” Mewtwo admitted.

“Ya should!” Meowth cheered.

<I wonder who those people in the corner are?> Mew hummed, <their faces are turning lots of interesting colors!>

Mewtwo glanced over. A man with a cape—Lance Blackthorn, he vaguely remembered Victoria telling stories of how she was going to “grind his ego into the dust”—looked like he would rather be dead and buried in a grave than anywhere near here, downing a glass of champagne like it was whiskey. Beside him, the old lady who looked suspiciously like The Gram-gram—Agatha, her name was—looked like her birthday had come early. Two others whose names Victoria had never bothered telling him looked mildly terrified, while the last, a woman, looked nearly as tired of everything as their precious champion.

Mew gave a wave.

Three of them flinched, while Blackthorn downed another glass of champagne and the woman closed her eyes.

Mewtwo couldn’t help but let out a chuckle.

It was very cathartic.

Perhaps Victoria had the right idea all along.

Chapter Text

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | I Have Been Forsaken
Dogs like Dad more than me TT_TT *sobs*
Comments 20.9k | Likes 23.5k | Rechirps 21k

✔︎ @westpeninsulaarcaninetrainer | Arcany Dad Vicky stop making Growlithe eyes at Lucario

— ✔︎ @westpeninsulaarcaninetrainer | Arcany Dad Also we are literally right next to you

— ✔︎ @IronVictory14 | I Have Been Forsaken :P 

— [ Click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | YOU SHALL BE MY SQUISHY
LOOK AT MY GOOMY! LOOK AT THEM
THEY WOOGLE

[Photo: an enormous puddle of goomy dotted around a clearing. They all look like small shiny balls scattered around the grass and sticking to trees.]

[Photo: two goomy staring at each other, their bodies stretching to either side like wiggly jello that has been poked]

[Photo: three goomy sitting in tree branches, one of whom is slowly squidging down the tree, and another is drooping over the sides like melting ice cream]

[Click to view all 36 photos]

Comments 14.2k | Likes 25k | Rechirps 19.1k

@ElectricZapster They do, in fact, woogle

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 Indeed, my good fellow

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 Verily, my friend

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@TwisterTail_42 They are so cute

@BulbaBuddy_567 whaaaaaat! (awwwwww)

— @ZapThunderZubat_555 yay!

— @ZubatZoomer_11 Truly the master of subtext and tone

— @rhyhornrumble_44 what

— @PokeMystic_23 What

— @wooperwhirl_888 I applaud your dedication to the bit, Buddy

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@SolarFlareFlareon_111 Only IronVictory would discover a completely new Pokemon species and, instead of keeping them secret as a trump card, immediately spam the entire internet with thirty six photos of her squishmons

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 The pure chaos energy this has

— @rhyhornrumble_44 the research stations are probably crying rivers of joy

— @BlazinChar_1234 @rhyhornrumble_44 can confirm, researcher uncle has made several offerings of tears to the shrine

— @rhyhornrumble_44 @BlazinChar_1234 wtf

— @AquaRush_2000 The pure BADASS energy this has - “I don’t need your silly information advantages”

— @PsyWaveEevee_199 squishmons is the best word I have seen today

— @meowthmelody88 @PsyWaveEevee_199 I raise you: woogle

— @PsyWaveEevee_199 @meowthmelody88 … second best word.

@MoonFrostJynx_456 YES THE GOOMY

Awwwww!

@MoonFrostJynx_456 Wait, so has a typing consensus been reached?

— @jigglypuffpulse ye

— @wooperwhirl_888 I think someone said dragon somewhere?

— @MysticMirrorEspeon_007 @wooperwhirl_888 seriously? Not poison?

— @FrostBlastGlalie_275 I don’t know

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@AeroSlashDragon_321 They’re just… perfect.

@BlazinChar_1234 They’re like little wiggly jello blobs

@VortexVineVileplume_275 The dictionary needs to be updated, we have a new word and that word is WOOGLE

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 please

— @meowthmelody88 this is gold, I would love to see it

— @BlazinChar_1234 I’ll get on that. Maybe my uncle has some researcher connections that could help

— @AquaAeroSeadra_555 I cannot believe we are actually rewriting the dictionary

— @VortexVineVileplume_275 @AquaAeroSeadra_555 BUT THEY WOOGLE

— @AquaAeroSeadra_555 @VortexVineVileplume_275 with the caps?

— @VortexVineVileplume_275 @AquaAeroSeadra_555 do I look like a coward?

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@IronDelcatty16 | Elizabeth I was peer-pressured into signing up for this site. I do not know who will be reading this, but do not expect me to care.

@IronDelcatty16 | Elizabeth My Skitty has been training hard. [Click to see 3 photos]

@IronDelcatty16 | Elizabeth I have been instructed to post more frequently. Thus, I am happy to announce that I have completed my 3rd badge challenge.

@IronDelcatty16 | Elizabeth My cousin is certifiably insane. A GYARADOS?

— @meowthmelody88 I don’t who you are but this is hilarious, I’m gonna spectate with popcorn

@IronDelcatty16 | Elizabeth What do you do when your cousin leaves a hole in your clan compound with a pokemon that has the potential to cause a diplomatic crisis

— @PikAurora_151 Um. You okay there?

— @IronDelcatty16 | Elizabeth I will be significantly better once the courtyard has been repaired.

@IronDelcatty16 | Elizabeth 6th badge challenge complete.

— @TwisterTail_42 Hey, congrats!

— @IronDelcatty16 | Elizabeth Thank you.

— @PikAurora_151 woo!

— @MysticWarpGengar_666 heck yea

@IronDelcatty16 | Elizabeth I don’t care what this site is used for. I am going to rant about my birds-damned cousin. What the HELL is she thinking? I… [click to expand]

— @MysticWarpGengar_666 LOL

— @meowthmelody88 this is pure gold

— @LeafBurstVenus_143 I don’t know who this lady is but these stories are wild wtf, who even is this cousin

— @PikAurora_151 no one knows

@IronDelcatty16 | Elizabeth Sometimes, I don’t understand my cousin.

— @TogepiTales11 LOL

— @MoonFrostJynx_456 the unintentional shitposts are the best

— @AquaAeroSeadra_555 I keep hearing these stories about your cousin, who the hell is she

— @IronDelcatty16 | Elizabeth @AquaAeroSeadra_555 Her name is Victoria Ferrous.

— @PikAurora_151 …

— @meowthmelody88 All of a sudden everything makes so much more sense

— @IronDelcatty16 | Elizabeth You know her?

— @meowthmelody88 Yeah she’s internet-famous

— @meowthmelody88 Among other things.

— @IronDelcatty16 | Elizabeth Excuse me??

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Forever and Ever <3
Mimikyu is love. Mimikyu is life. Mimikyu is the God of the crafts store
Comments 22.1k | Likes 24.5k | Rechirps 21.1k

@BulbaBuddy_567 What…?

— @PsyduckPulse23 what?

— @jigglypuffpulse wat

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@IceBeamSquirtle_128 I don’t know what happened. I don’t want to know what happened. All I know was that it ended well and apparently we have another God.

— @AquaRush_2000 Chansey needed a fellow deity

— [ Click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Be My Friend. That Is a Threat
TRAINING SUCCESS PARTYYYY!

[Photo: a beaming Vicky in her signature straw hat, arm slung around the shoulders of a pretty Unovan girl with long hair and a stylish trainer’s outfit. The girl has a distinctly disgruntled look on her face, and seems to be attempting to escape out from under Vicky’s arm. An orange blur can be seen in the background]

[Photo: the Unovan girl has given up on getting out of Vicky’s Ursaring-trap of an arm and seems thoroughly resigned to being there. Vicky is laughing and throwing up a peace sign. In the background, the orange blur has sharpened into an Arcanine… which is fast approaching, followed by a pale blue and peach streak identified as a Milotic.]

[Photo: The two humans in the photo have been swarmed by a Serperior, a Fraxure popping up from the bottom right, a Dragonite paw pulling Vicky by the shoulder, and a large Arcanine still speeding straight towards the camera. The Unovan girl has a look of terror on her face, while Vicky has a look of delighted surprise.]

[Photo: the central focus is just 2 snoots, one of which is clearly an Arcanine nose, and the other which is a Milotic beak. A hand is stretching out desperately to grab the phone along the right side, while on the left viewers can see the Unovan girl facepalming miserably.]

Comments 21.4k | Likes 23.9k | Rechirps 20.2k

@EeveeEnigma_96 Is this truly a success

— @PsyduckPulse23 yes

— @FlamewingRapid_789 Yes

— @SolarShockFlare_888 Is anything truly a Success?

— @wooperwhirl_888 I wonder. 

— @BlazeWingPony_789 Yes.

— @rhyhornrumble_44 these photos are glorious, this cannot constitute anything less

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Done Vicky did you even get Zelos’s permission

— @zelosbia | The Serperior One Unfortunately yes

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@JoltiXer_242 Um. How strong is Vicky? She just caged that girl in her biceps

— @jigglypuffpulse stronk

— @AquaRush_2000 she literally fought a fighting-type. And WON

— @DragonFury_Draco_56 @AquaRush_2000 wait when was this

— @ThunderQuakeOnix_007 I have so many thoughts and I shall say none of them

— @PsyduckPulse23 very stronk

— @AquaRush_2000 @DragonFury_Draco_56 1st encounter with Riolu, 2 weeks ago

— ✔︎ @GetGainsWeightTrainingClub Join our weight training program! Under the guidance of our Goddess, the one and only Chansey, you too can… [ click to expand ]

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@SerperiorCoil22 Oooh cool new trainer to follow. Serperiors rock

— @TotodileSplash21 heck yea serperior represent

— @AmpharosAura68 Wooo! Friends

— @PiloswinePower03 I hope she’s not as crazy as Vicky

— @SolarFlareFlareon_111 @PiloswinePower03 I hope she IS as crazy as Vicky

— @HydroVortexBlast_987 guys no one can be as crazy as vicky

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@SolarShockFlare_888An Unovan?

@ThunderQuakeOnix_007 By what metric are we judging a “success” party

— @PokeMystic_23 I do not question. I accept

— @wooperwhirl_888 Any of them

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 LOL

— @PsyduckPulse23 one does not judge the party. One judges the metric. We must not be constrained by such simple shackles

— @MysticWarpGengar_666 It’s a party why not

— @ZapThunderZubat_555 how much floof

— @AeroSlashDragon_321 levels of panic

— @EeveeEnigma_96 Pick one that MAKES it a success

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@MysticWarpGengar_666 I wanna see the ghost!

@MarillMuse_444 My condolences for that poor girl caught up in Vicky’s… everything

@MysticMirrorEspeon_007 Wait did vicky have a serperior?

— @PikAurora_151 No, that and Fraxure are probably the other girl’s

— @HydroVortexBlast_987 nope

— @FrostBlastGlalie_275 maybe? I think she has a full team tho

@TwisterTail_42 Aww floof

— @rhyhornrumble_44 floof

— @FlamewingRapid_789 Floof! Fluffy Arcanine!

@AeroSlashDragon_321 More dragonite content pls

@wooperwhirl_888 Did everyone just gloss over that this was a TRAINING session?

— @AquaSurgeGyarados_8888 I wonder what they were training

— @MoonFrostJynx_456 We’ll probably see at the Conference

— [ Click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | New Dragon Master In Town
:D :D :D 
Comments 21.3k | Likes 24.9k | Rechirps 18k

@ElectricZapster I don’t know whether to feel sheer excitement at the pure chaos this radiates or sheer terror. This never bodes well

— @ZubatZoomer_11 this ALWAYS bodes well, what are you talking about

@EeveeEnigma_96 Uh oh…

@IceSlashWeavile_314 I’m, uh… a little concerned at that nickname. Like, the gible wasn’t menacing enough???

— @IceSlashWeavile_314 is there a new dragon type??? Is it dangerous??? Is this a prank??? What is happening???

— @AquaRush_2000 *gives headpats* there, there

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@jigglypuffpulse :D 

— @ThunderBoltRaichu_2000 :P 

— @JoltiXer_242 :) :) :)

— @rhyhornrumble_44 :0

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 :D 

— [ Click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy She’s been like this since Lance visited

— @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Done WTF LANCE VISITED???

— ✔︎ @creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy Yeah, uh, a lot happened?

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 yEs

— @ElectricZapster nO

@BulbaBuddy_567 What…?

— @PsyduckPulse23 *shrug*

— @rhyhornrumble_44 me too, buddy

— @jigglypuffpulse meh

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@EmberFlashMagmar_777 LOL classic

@PikAurora_151 Excuse me did you all see Ivy’s comment

— @PokeMystic_23 Yes

— @ZubatZoomer_11 yup

— @PikAurora_151 We gonna talk about that?

— @PsyduckPulse23 nope

— @rhyhornrumble_44 yes

— @jigglypuffpulse nu

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@JynxJive_789 So I read the newest IronVictory shitpost. It’s ominous. That’s fine. It’s practically expected at this point. Then I go down to the comments and WTF APPARENTLY LANCE VISITED HER????

— [ Click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @lanceblackthornofficial | Indigo Champion Lance
Goomy are squishy
Comments 21.7k | Likes 30.2k | Rechirps 29.8k

EeveeEnigma_96 Pardon?

— @SolarShockFlare_888 you have been pardoned

— @PokeMystic_23 LOL

@HydroVortexBlast_987 Uh I think Lance took over the account

— @HydroVortexBlast_987 wdm? This is Lance’s official acc

— @HydroVortexBlast_987 Yeah, but how often does he actually post things like this

@DragonTwistite_42 Oh my gosh is Lance shitposting?? Is the world coming to an end???

@MarillMuse_444 Well I guess the goomy typing debate has officially been settled

— @rhyhornrumble_44 praise the birds

— @EeveeEnigma_96 finally

— @AeroSlashDragon_321 I KNEW IT! I CALLED IT! IT WAS DRAGON ALL ALONG!

— @EmberFlareon_777 seriously??? 

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 ThE cHaOs SpReAdS

✔︎ @IndigoFanReviews Normally I post an actual review. But at the moment… what the actual HECK.

@AmpharosAura68 This is the first time I’ve seen that guy post anything

— @MysticMirrorEspeon_007 uh he’s posted lots

— @psyKickachu dude do u even kno how 2 use this 

— @wooperwhirl_888 Champion Lance has posted a lot though? Usually League info and I think a couple of car ads?

— @AmpharosAura68 Ok, I’ll rephrase: This is the first time I’ve seen that guy post anything that isn’t League related or an ad campaign

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@jigglypuffpulse squish

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 squish

— @SolarShockFlare_888 squish

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@GyaradosRoar50 GOOMY

— @EmberFlareon_777 goomy

— @FlamewingRapid_789 goomy

— @AquaSurgeGyarados_8888 Goomy

— @MysticLeafLeafeon_111 i have found my people

— @jigglypuffpulse goom

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@AquaRush_2000 2 goomy posts in one day???

— @PiloswinePower03 What? Where’s the 2nd?

— @VoltMagnetJolt_314 @PiloswinePower03 check @IronVictory14 she posted a couple goomy pics as well… on top of the 40 or so she posted like a week ago

— @PokeMystic_23 Ok new conspiracy theory: IronVictory stole Lance’s account

— @FrostBlastGlalie_275 I’M TELLING YOU THIS IS A CONSPIRACY

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 lol I was wondering where my ironvictory peeps were

— [ Click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @IndigoPlateauOfficial | Indigo Plateau This is the Indigo Plateau PR team. We apologize for the confusion about the previous post. It was indeed made by Champion Lance.

— @VortexVineVileplume_275 I wanna be so famous that a PR team has to confirm my shitposts

— @meowthmelody88 Note how they didn’t actually take it down

— @LeafBurstVenus_143 … that’s it? No explanation?

— @ThunderPichu_007 Legends

— [ Click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | New Dragon Master In Town :D :D :D 

— @PsyWaveEevee_199 ominous

— @JynxJive_789 again???

—  @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Done Vicky. Vicky, this is the champion’s Pidgey profile. Why are you replying publically on the Champion’s Pidgey profile. VICKY-

— @CharmanderCharm Oh dear.

— [ Click to see more replies ]

Chapter Text

✔︎ @creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy
Help what do you do when your best friend has just received a challenge from the regional champion who came to her house in person
Comments 22.2k | Likes 25.1k | Rechirps 22k

@EeveeEnigma_96 …??????

@rhyhornrumble_44 lol suffer

@BulbaBuddy_567 … what

— @FlamewingRapid_789 WHAT

— @JoltiXer_242 … yep

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@wooperwhirl_888 Excuse me WHAT???

@DragonFury_Draco_56 Lance came to someone’s house???

@MysticMirrorEspeon_007 WTF??? Why haven’t we heard anything

— @meowthmelody88 yes we did

— @MysticMirrorEspeon_007 @meowthmelody88 where???

— @meowthmelody88 @MysticMirrorEspeon_007 IronVictory spamming the past 3 days

— @MysticMirrorEspeon_007 @meowthmelody88 it was all just ominous smiley faces???

— @meowthmelody88 @MysticMirrorEspeon_007 exactly

— @jigglypuffpulse lol

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@IceBeamSquirtle_128 Post about it on pidgeychat apparently

— @AquaSurgeGyarados_8888 LOL

@SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 Wtf

@AquaRush_2000 bless you Ivy

@PokeMystic_23 yessss share the gossip

@JynxJive_789 Do I want context?

— @MarillMuse_444 IronVictory’s previous like 3 posts

— @ZubatZoomer_11 apparently Lance is fond of goomies

— @JynxJive_789 @ZubatZoomer_11 that doesn’t help

— @jigglypuffpulse no

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Done Why didn’t I hear about this??? I missed Lance???

— @EmberFlareon_777 RIP Kiba

— @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Done @EmberFlareon_777 oi

✔︎ @KarateChopKing_2 | Bruno E4 Can someone please explain to me why Lance was grumbling about not being a flying master???

✔︎ @IceQueen_030 | Lorelei E4 Victoria Ferrous.

✔︎ @KarateChopKing_2 | Bruno E4 ????

✔︎ @GengarRules_000 | Agatha E4 ^^

✔︎ @KarateChopKing_2 | Bruno E4 that doesn’t explain anything???

✔︎ @lanceblackthornofficial | Indigo Champion Lance Suffer.

✔︎ @KarateChopKing_2 | Bruno E4 why are you still on your official PR account???

✔︎ @lanceblackthornofficial | Indigo Champion Lance Suffer.

✔︎ @GengarRules_000 | Agatha E4 Dear.

✔︎ @DragoniteDragonmight | Lance E4 Yes ma’am I have changed back to my personal account.

✔︎ @KarateChopKing_2 | Bruno E4 LOL Agatha scaring the children

✔︎ @GengarRules_000 | Agatha E4 ^^

[ One message deleted ]:

✔︎ @DragoniteDragonmight | Lance E4 Yes ma’am I have changed back to my personal account.

✔︎ @GengarRules_000 | Agatha E4 ^^

…

✔︎ @GengarRules_000 | Agatha E4 Excellent.

✔︎ @KarateChopKing_2 | Bruno E4 …
✔︎ @KarateChopKing_2 | Bruno E4 …so can anyone answer the original question?

✔︎ @IceQueen_030 | Lorelei E4 Suffer.

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEE
EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE MY BABYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY
[Photo: Mimikyu’s new Milotic costume.]
[Photo: Mimikyu’s new Milotic costume, close up on the buttons.]
[Photo: Mimikyu’s new Milotic costume from the back.]
[Photo: Mimikyu posing in the Milotic costume.]
[ Click to view all 53 photos ]
Comments 22.2k | Likes 25.1k | Rechirps 22k

@BulbaBuddy_567 What!!!!

— @SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 WHAT

— @EeveeEnigma_96 What!

— @ElectricZapster Ayyyy!!

— @ThunderQuakeOnix_007 Commitment

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@MysticMirrorEspeon_007 SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

@JynxJive_789 THAT. IS. SO. CUTE.

@LeafBurstVenus_143 AWWWWWWWW

@rhyhornrumble_44 I wanna see milotic’s reaction

— @MoonFrostJynx_456 SAME

@PokeMystic_23 Oh my birds I am MELTING

@MarillMuse_444 Did Mimikyu make that themselves????

@CharmanderCharm Such an adorable Pokemon! And quite versatile at that. Imagine the contest possibilities!!!

@AquaRush_2000 OH MY BIRDS. HOLY DISTORTION

@ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 iT iS a BeAuTiFuL nUgGeT oF cHaOs

@PikAurora_151 Guys. Guys. GUYS. Imagine if Mimikyu had an ENTIRE CLOSET of just more outfits

— @SolarShockFlare_888 HOLY HO-OH

— @HydroVortexBlast_987 AAAAAAAAAAAAAA

— @rhyhornrumble_44 too precious. I am ded

— @wooperwhirl_888 PLEASE tell me this is happening

— @FrostBlastGlalie_275 @IronVictory14 if this doesn’t happen I will RIOT

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@ZubatZoomer_11 Hello everyone. We’re starting a donation drive for tiny Mimikyu costumes. Please contact us on the official fanpage for… [ Click to expand ]

— @IceSlashWeavile_314 YESSS

— @meowthmelody88 oh Distortion this is going to be amazing

— @PokeMystic_23 imagine mimikyu facing off against a pokemon wearing their costume

— [ Click to see more replies ]

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Kamehameha!
Babies’ first battle!!!
[Photo: a milotic doll, identified by viewers as a Mimikyu, wiggles happily in Vicky’s arms, shadowy black tendrils wrapping around the girl in an excited—but no less terrifying—hug. A fainted zubat lies in the dirt across from them. The kid across from them looks really grumpy.]
[Photo: a gray metal pokemon with large yellow plates in its head, identified by viewers as a Jangmo-o, slumps tiredly. An old man stands across the ring with a smile on his face and a pidgeotto on his shoulder.]
[Photo: an adorable noodle of a dratini looking up cutely at the camera, the background clearly the same dirt of the square from the previous photos.]
[Photo: a goomy woogles its way into the ring, this time facing a Charmander. Vicky is clearly excited about something and pumping a fist. The old man on the other side of the ring is grinning.]
[Photo: a Riolu leaping into the air in a victory position. Across the ring, an older man has a rueful grin on his lips, taking out a pokeball to return his fainted Charmander. A cluster of kids stand in the background, spectating the fight.]
Comments 22.2k | Likes 25.1k | Rechirps 22k

@ZubatZoomer_11 Woah she DEMOLISHED that Zubat

— @BlazeWingPony_789 Lol RIP zubat

— @rhyhornrumble_44 good luck kid

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@BlazinChar_1234 Super cool

@BulbaBuddy_567 What! :D

— @LeafBurstVenus_143 happy what!

— @jigglypuffpulse wat  oAo

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@EmberFlareon_777 THAT MILOTIC MIMIKYU COSTUME THO

@ElectricZapster How is she always so high-energy

— @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Done spite

@PsyduckPulse23 What exactly is her nickname this time?

— @MysticLeafLeafeon_111 no clue

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 not the first time she’s made up a word or something

— @VoltMagnetJolt_314 you’d have to ask vicky. Or maybe ivy

— ✔︎ @creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy I don’t know either. But she has a habit of making up weird noises and yelling them so who knows

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@MoonFrostJynx_456 YESSS MORE GOOMY!

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 and Mimikyu!!!

— @TwisterTail_42 All the cuties

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@AeroSlashDragon_321 DRATINI DRATINI DRATINI

— @MysticWarpGengar_666 Dude Blackthorn must be going absolutely bananas

— @HydroVortexBlast_987 @MysticWarpGengar_666 the RESEARCH STATIONS must be going bananas

— @ZapThunderZubat_555 everyone is going bananas

— @MarillMuse_444 Yeah, they finally have a chance to document a dragonite line from egg to final evo without being gatekept by Blackthorn

— @DragonTwistite_42 Lol RIP

— @DragonFury_Draco_56 DRAGONS!!! SO MANY DRAGONS!!!

— @AquaRush_2000 YESSSS

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@MysticMirrorEspeon_007 Since when does she have a Riolu??

— @rhyhornrumble_44 uh since like a month ago

@SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 Me 5 mins ago: I am a homebody. A lazy snorlax. I will not be getting off my couch for anything short of a house fire or a rampaging rhydon. Me right now: A’IGHT LISTEN UP WHEN’S THE NEXT TRAIN TO FUSCHIA-

@PokeMystic_23 There’s a clear change in the daylight between the fourth and fifth photos. Did something happen?

— @VortexVineVileplume_275 okay wow then, sleuth

— @SolarShockFlare_888 I think you’re just grasping at straws

— @MarillMuse_444 Huh, you’re right. Maybe they took a break?

— @AquaAeroSeadra_555 that’s weird

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@TogepiTales11 I was in that square. That Riolu freaking punched her and she wasn’t even fazed.

— @ZapTailPikachu_143 wtf

— @AmpharosAura68 wait which one are you

— @TogepiTales11 @AmpharosAura68 the one in green in the back

— @jigglypuffpulse I call hax

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@BlazeWingPony_789 OH MY GOSH I NEED TO HEAD TO FUSCHIA

— @AquaAeroSeadra_555 I know right???

— @FrostBlastGlalie_275 gonna grab my pokemon and YEET-

— @ThunderBoltRaichu_2000 Fuschia gonna get a huge uptick in tourism

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 Vicky singlehandedly boosting the city’s economy

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@wooperwhirl_888 Whoever commented above about the time difference is so right. The angle of the shadows has changed by a LOT. Either they took a break or something else happened

— @VortexVineVileplume_275 I think the Riolu challenged the Charmander twice

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 huh. Did something happen?

[Text chat with 2 people:]

@OddishSprout21 Mari
@OddishSprout21 Koga was laughing

@MarillMuse_444 … Is this unusual?

@OddishSprout21 Yes
@OddishSprout21 It’s Koga
@OddishSprout21 And it was after that super-secret meeting that everyone tried to eavesdrop on but his golbat kept running interference

@MarillMuse_444 Well that’s not ominous all
@MarillMuse_444 Do you know what he was laughing about?

@OddishSprout21 Something about a regional permit
@OddishSprout21 Should I be worried

@MarillMuse_444 Nah, it’s probably just some league official. They might have to travel outside the region for their jobs. It’s rare, but it happens. Probably nothing special

@OddishSprout21 Ye but Koga was laughing.
@OddishSprout21 KOGA
@OddishSprout21 He NEVER laughs

@MarillMuse_444 Huh. I don’t know what to tell you

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | I Have A Plan. Maybe.
Going on a trip. BRB
Comments 22.2k | Likes 25.1k | Rechirps 22k

@ElectricZapster Um

— @wooperwhirl_888 Uh

— @PsyduckPulse23 Uh oh

@MarillMuse_444 The last time she said she was going on a trip, she posted a picture of a pokeball covered in blood, brought back a female of a characteristic, super-protected Sinnoh powerhouse pokemon, made her friend a living meme, discovered a new ghost-type, brought back 30 type-unidentified pokemon (now known to be birds-be-damned DRAGONS), and I’m pretty sure ACTUALLY KILLED one of the Indigo researchers

— @rhyhornrumble_44 ye I hear they found a good replacement tho

— @PsyduckPulse23 @rhyhornrumble_44 THAT’S what you’re taking from this???

— @LeafBurstVenus_143 Holy Distortion what the f—

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 Mimikyu is kinda cute tho

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 What the f— did she do

— @VoltMagnetJolt_314 @IceBeamSquirtle_128 buddy if you figure that out please share

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 oMiNoUs aNd gLoRiOuS

@BulbaBuddy_567 What.

— @jigglypuffpulse whAT

— @EeveeEnigma_96 What???

— @ElectricZapster hey buddy!

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@AquaRush_2000 AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

— @EeveeEnigma_96 AAAAAAAAAAAAAA

— @ZubatZoomer_11 AAAHHHHHH

— @SolarFlareFlareon_111 AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

— @psyKickachu lol y r u screaming

— @ZapThunderZubat_555 aaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAaaaaaaAAAAA

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@meowthmelody88 Sooo… are we gonna get pidgey updates from this trip or is it gonna be like last time? By which I mean is Mystic going to have to get out the conspiracy board with the red string again?

— @PokeMystic_23 bold of you to assume that’s ever been put away

— @CharmanderCharm oh dear

— @rhyhornrumble_44 with the levels of cryptid we’ve experienced I’m not holding out hope

— @CharmanderCharm I hope we get updates

@ThunderQuakeOnix_007 What trip??? Where??? Huh???

@ZubatZoomer_11 I live in both anticipation and fear

— @MysticWarpGengar_666 me too dude

@TogepiTales11 … can someone pls explain why we are screaming

— @AquaAeroSeadra_555 it’s Vicky

— @TogepiTales11 Ah

@MysticWarpGengar_666 Did anyone else find that the nickname made it MORE ominous?

@JynxJive_789 Sooo… where is she going?

@PiloswinePower03

So, uh. I know I’m new to the community, since I’m in Johto, but I’m pretty sure I might have spotted something you guys might want to see…

[Photo of a very recognizable tower: the Violet Gym run by Gym Leader Falkner in Violet City, Johto. Near the entrance to the building, a figure in a familiar straw hat and flannel outfit looks up at the tower. Just behind her, meticulous observers can just faintly make out the red glow of a returned pokemon, in the distinct shape of a dragonite.]

Comments 20.3k | Likes 18.4k | Rechirps 29.3k

@BulbaBuddy_567 HOLY SHIT

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[Text chat with 2 people:]

@OddishSprout21 Holy shit

@MarillMuse_444 Um. Okay then. I’m never going to say anything against you and your crazy intuition again

@OddishSprout21 HOLY SHIT

—--------------------------

[To all users: The PidgeyChat outage has been identified as a sudden surge in requests, overloading our servers. We are pleased that you have found our product enjoyable, and look forward to getting it back up and running soon. Please bear with us as we continue to improve our systems.]

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✔︎ @creepingivy52 | Grass Supremacy
Congrats, Vicky. You broke the internet.
Comments 20.7k | Likes 20.1k | Rechirps 28.1k

Chapter Text

Vicky was a woman on a mission.

She was headed on a trip soon, so she wanted to get this absolutely squared away. Which led her here, to the front doors of the Viridian gym. To face the evil mastermind, Giovanni.

Vicky took a deep breath, lifted her foot…

And kicked down the door with a resounding BANG!

The door hinges squealed and snapped off of the frame, and the entire metal door was completely dented from the force, bouncing a couple times on the floor and skidding to a halt, right before the large mahogany front desk, behind which an old, balding man with a very familiar scowl whipped his head up and stared at her in shock.

Vicky strode inside, pointed a threatening finger at him, and shouted loudly, “Giovanni, they're mine now!”

Giovanni’s eyes finally settled on her figure as she stomped into the room, nudging the metal door to the side with a foot. He set down his pen atop the stack of paperwork. Vicky watched as his face ran a truly impressive gamut of expressions before finally settling on resigned annoyance.

“Pardon,” he said through gritted teeth, “what, in the name of Ho-Oh, are you doing, exactly?”

Vicky looked him in the eyes. “Jessie and James are mine now. So is Meowth. You can’t do anything about it.”

Giovani snorted, then looked surprised, as if he couldn’t believe that sound had come out of his mouth. “Those idiots? You want them ?”

Vicky stared at him in baffled silence. “... oh my Arceus you have no idea what you're missing.”

Giovanni stared at her with a distorted expression. It looked like he was half-confused and half constipated. Vicky silently felt bad for him; constipation sucked.

“Well, anyway, here are all the legal paper’s you’ll need—” she pulled out the small stack from her bag and slammed it against the reception desk of the gym. Giovanni stared at her, “—just take a look and we’re good. Oh and your freaking star team sucks. ” She huffed in indignation. “If I never have to come back to this dump again it’ll be too soon.”

Giovanni’s eyebrow was twitching. It was quite interesting to watch. He picked up the papers. A vein started pulsing on his face, and his eyebrow twitching gradually increased in speed. It was like a ticking time bomb, and Vicky suddenly decided that she had probably spent enough time in the Viridian gym for the day. She could come back to dunk on him more later. 

“These… papers… ” Giovanni seemed to be dragging the words out of his throat and through his teeth like they had thorns. “Just have the words, ‘suck it, Giovanni, I can be a much better crime boss than you ever were and I’m taking your minions’ on it.”

“Yep.”

Vicky grinned, gave him the peace sign, and left the gym cackling.

As soon as she arrived home and swung herself off of Dragonite’s back, Dad and Gram-gram checked in immediately to make sure she was alright and that everything had worked out. It was kind of sweet; Vicky had noticed over the past week or so that they were the most ardent supporters for the Rocket trio’s adoption, and for good reason. Dad desperately needed another Growlithe enthusiast before he was overrun by cat people in this house, and James had immediately endeared himself to her dad with his enthusiastic and often self-sacrificing cuddle-time with the growlithe puppies. Gram-gram, on the other hand, just wanted someone to cackle evilly with while playing backgammon, and Jessie seemed to be on the exact same wavelength.

Her mom had also taken her aside and commented that the three of them were somehow generating more income for the farm than the Prism Scale trade. Unbelievably. She wasn’t entirely sure how. 

“They keep doing stuff so well that if I didn’t know you picked them up off the streets—” she ignored Vicky’s screech that she didn’t pick them up off the streets, “—I would have thought that it was their literal job. And they’ve done this for twenty things already . Farming crops, feeding the pokemon, construction, electrical equipment, catering, straight-up fancy galas, bartering for gemstones, nursing?? —settling neighborhood disputes, driving…” She brought a hand to her forehead and rubbed it. “Where the heck did you find these people??”

Vicky thought back to the TRio’s shenanigans and abilities shown during the cartoon show. Between their various disguises, marketing ability—which was what she had decided to generously call their ability to spew absolute nonsense and talk their way around even the most stoic of characters—mechanical ability to build and fix giant robots, and the fact that they needed to purchase those robots from somewhere in the first place… If even half of those were true-to-life, the Rocket trio could unironically be absolute money-making champions.

“Yeah,” she had commented to her mom, “just let them run wild. They’ll probably triple the profits. At minimum.”

Her mother looked likely to faint.

A chorus of joyful screams sounded from the next room as the three money-making champions in question learned what had just transpired in Viridian Gym. 

Vicky made the executive decision to get herself the heck out of there, before she was either mauled or forced into a group hug. Group hugs were for pokemon only!

Thankfully, the TRio were happy with their new digs.

Unfortunately, the TRio were a bit too happy with their new digs — she’d been having to dodge exuberant James-hugs and Jessie’s rapid-fire fashion advice for the past week. 

She stubbornly refused to acknowledge the warmth in her chest — was this what it felt like to have siblings? Jessie had single-handedly updated her entire wardrobe, and she had to admit, it didn’t look bad. Plus, she had generously let Vicky keep the majority of her flannels, despite Jessie’s vehement, loud protests. James was exuberantly emotional as usual, wrapping her in octopus-hugs every so often. And Meowth slow-blinking at her from across the room and then pretending he never did anything of the sort was flipping adorable.

Too many feelings for now. Vicky shrugged.

“Welp, I’m off to Johto,” she announced.

The entire family stared in shock.

… Oops. Maybe it wasn’t a good idea to announce that in the middle of family dinner. What, did they think she wouldn’t be responsible or something? Rude.

Her mother’s face was getting a very pale white. Her dad’s face was getting dangerously red. Jessie, James, and Meowth seemed oblivious, while Mewtwo simply observed the scene like a particularly fascinating literary play. Mew giggled in the corner.

Bang!

Before anyone could say anything, Gram-gram immediately slammed a hand on the table. Vicky jumped. Her mom and dad flinched back. Vicky was pleased to see that neither of them looked to be on the verge of passing out anymore. Being too angry was bad for your blood pressure, after all.

Unfortunately, loud noises seemed to be only a temporary solution, as the two of them looked to be rapidly gaining and losing color once more. Damn. She thought she would have a couple more supporters with this plan… maybe it was time to enact that one plan—

Gram-gram, ignoring her inner monologue, interrupted her thoughts, and commanded, “get a cat.”

Well, at least she had one supporter.

Vicky promptly saluted her Gram-gram. She opened her mouth to say “aye aye,” then rapidly glanced around at her mother’s furious staring and her dad’s puce face, and decided that it might be better for everyone’s health and safety that she refrain.

“I already have one in mind,” she said instead.

Vicky and Gram-gram grinned at each other. The tension seemed to deflate.

She ignored the sound of her mom facepalming in the background, her dad’s despairing sighs, Jessie commenting on Johto fashion, and James being dog-piled by the rest of the growlithe, that no longer had dad to distract them. She and Gram-gram were having a stare-off, after all!

Vicky blinked. Darn.  

Gram-gram cackled in triumph. 

“Welp, no time like the present,” she muttered. Her mom’s head shot up and focused on her. She grinned. “Welp. See ya when I get back!”

Vicky sprinted out of the dining room to the sound of her mom’s shouts.

“Victoria Ferrous! Get back here right this instant!”

It took a couple days of hunting down old rumors, leaving cat food out on cliffs, climbing rocks, tracking down rainstorms, and generally scouting out promising areas, before she finally found her destined cat.

And he was perfect.

He was super energetic, which fit right in with her team. It was almost like having a second Arcanine! They both had ALL the zoomies — it made mealtimes and training a bit difficult, but it was nothing she couldn’t handle. Plus, her new darling boy was so endearingly protective! When she saw him prowling around their campsite or curling with narrowed eyes on the other end of a campfire, it was like that moment when you found a cat and they decided you were their human, every time. It was the best feeling ever.

… not so much when she had to drag him away from a fight, though. After all, he was also a huge battle junkie. That was definitely like having a second Arcanine. Maybe the two of them could tire each other out when they started going at it. He would fit in great, and Arcanine could get a new friend. She could already tell, they were going to be best of friends.

She glanced at the growling, yipping, and snarling pair. They truly get along like cats and dogs. But rivals are the first step to making friends! Just like me and Zelos! She smiled happily.

Awwww, she loved him so much, he was going to fit in great with everyone!

Gram-gram might go nuts. Scratch that—her mom was going to go nuts. Gram-gram would love him. Or maybe love the chaos that came with him. Or both, both was good.

Yes, Vicky thought, leaning back against the tree to watch her pokemon frolicking joyfully, Raikou is a fantastic choice.

“Vicky,” her mom deadpanned.

Uh oh.

“ Please tell me you actually thought for a moment about the current political climate, and didn’t just catch one of Johto’s legendaries.”

Welp. In for a penny, in for a pound. Vicky shrugged. “If they wanna whine like a baby about a cat being actually taken care of then they can come and try to take him from me.”

“ VICKY— ”

“Victoria?”

“Yeah?” Vicky leaned her head upside-down over the back of the couch to look at Mewtwo. Still grounded for another 36 hours.

“You do realize that the other two individuals of what is commonly referred to as the Johto Legendary Trio are also cats?”

Vicky blinked. She flipped back around and quickly searched. The only references she had in this world were from ancient murals and lore, but they gave enough of an outline that she could jog her memory of what the Legendary Pokemon Entei and Suicune looked like.

She stared for a minute.

They really didn’t look like cats. Vicky paused.

“Seriously?” she muttered.

She glanced back at Mewtwo, then turned towards the door.

“GRAM-GRAM?” She hollered to the other end of the house, “CAN YOU GIVE ME A FORMAL DEFINITION FOR WHAT COUNTS AS A CAT?”

Chapter Text

✔︎ @PidgeyChatOfficial | Pidgey Chat Admin
We are pleased to announce our first patch, V1.14. We are happy to see the community’s engagement on our servers and hope to continue bringing more reliable connections and content to everyone’s daily lives. Happy chatting!
Comments 19.1k | Likes 20.5k | Rechirps 28.4k

@ZubatZoomer_11 You thinking what I’m thinking?

— @meowthmelody88 Probably not

@LeafBurstVenus_143 Three cheers to capitalism for getting stuff running again

@EmberFlareon_777 Ayyy so we’re just going to gloss over… everything?

— @MysticLeafLeafeon_111 yup

@HeracrossHero85 Hey! Johtoan here. Could anyone please explain what happened?

— @PikAurora_151 Oh. Oh buddy.

— @VoltMagnetJolt_314 2 words: “Iron Victory”

— @DragonFury_Draco_56 @VoltMagnetJolt_314 2 words “crazy trainer”

— @SolarFlareFlareon_111 The world imploded

— @rhyhornrumble_44 pidgey crashed

— @HeracrossHero85 @rhyhornrumble_44 no duh

— @FlamewingRapid_789 @VoltMagnetJolt_314 1 word: “CHAOS”

— @MysticWarpGengar_666 My dude, you’re in for a wild ride

— @jigglypuffpulse *pat pat*

— @meowthmelody88 oh you sweet summer child

— [ Click to see more replies ]

@AquaAeroSeadra_555 Hmmm… V… 14… Seems awfully suspicious…

@BlazeWingPony_789 So uh, I might not be a tech guy, but don’t things usually come out in numerical order? Like, if this is the first one, wouldn’t it be V1.11 or something?

— @VortexVineVileplume_275 yeah but they might have patched some stuff and just not announced it

— @IceSlashWeavile_314 I dunno

— @meowthmelody88 huh. You’re right.

— @MisdreavusMystic42 Um. I don’t know how to say this, but… Look at the number at the end of @IronVictory14. 

— @VoltMagnetJolt_314 …

— @MoonFrostJynx_456 The V doesn’t stand for Version, it stands for Victory lol

— @SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 @MoonFrostJynx_456 You can’t be serious

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@OddishSprout21 The content drought has ended! Praise the tech operator gods!

@ZapThunderZubat_555 LOL “we’ve finished our patch and f u to one person, specifically”

— @PikAurora_151 ???

@AquaSurgeGyarados_8888 Ayy congrats on getting the program back up!

@meowthmelody88 LOL I found this meme: [Photo: Vicky grins and makes a peace sign with her fingers. In the background, all that can be seen is an orange blur that vaguely resembles Arcanine and a pink blur that vaguely resembles Chansey absolutely going at each other, with the text “PidgeyChat” and “Vicky’s Twitter” superimposed. In the sky, a tan blur that looks like a dragonite can be seen dive-bombing the scuffle, with the text “V1.14” on top of it]

@ThunderBoltRaichu_2000 The whole theory about pidgey naming their patch after Vicky is a hoax, right? Right???

— @jigglypuffpulse no

— @PokeMystic_23 I mean…

— @SolarFlareFlareon_111 LOL

— @ThunderBoltRaichu_2000 guys??? Right???

@PsySprintKadabra_321 So, uh. Anyone else really, REALLY curious about the thing that started this mess?

— @LeafBurstVenus_143 do you WANT the internet to crash again???

— @ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 do not speak of it for thou shalt call upon the gods of despair

Group Chat - Johto Gym Circuit 

✔︎ @FlyingHigh01 | Falkner Heads up. The Kanto trainer has come to Johto
✔︎ @FlyingHigh01 | Falkner We all know the one I’m talking about 

✔︎ @RolloutTheTanks | Whitney Oh joy

✔︎ @prycewillow11 | Pryce Bloody Kantonians. Give Johto a decisive victory, everyone.

✔︎ @SpookySports_44 | Morty cool it with the patriotism, old man

✔︎ @StatelySteelix_7 | Jasmine Alright, stop squabbling.
✔︎ @StatelySteelix_7 | Jasmine @FlyingHigh01 What do we know about her team?

✔︎ @FlyingHigh01 | Falkner All I know is that her Lucario seems to be the weak link

✔︎ @StatelySteelix_7 | Jasmine That’s good. We can start targeting from there.
✔︎ @StatelySteelix_7 | Jasmine What about her other pokemon?

✔︎ @FlyingHigh01 | Falkner I don’t know.

✔︎ @SpookySports_44 | Morty …?

✔︎ @FlyingHigh01 | Falkner It felt like she was literally just letting Lucario out to practice. Once she went down, her Arcanine swept the rest of my elite team

✔︎ @StatelySteelix_7 | Jasmine …

✔︎ @HiveMind_B | Bugsy …

✔︎ @SpookySports_44 | Morty …

✔︎ @KarateKickKing5 | Chuck …

✔︎ @RolloutTheTanks | Whitney … 

✔︎ @prycewillow11 | Pryce Hmph.

✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Bug Besties
Made a friend, found some bugs, got a penpal out of it!
[Photo: Vicky’s grinning face is the only part of her body that’s clearly visible atop an enormous mound of caterpies, but astute viewers can also make out a thumbs-up from lower down in the pile. A VERY recognizable insect-catching net and side-pouch with a magnifying glass hanging from the side have been set to the side in the corner of the clearing.]
Comments 22.2k | Likes 25.1k | Rechirps 22k

— ✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Bug Besties Also can someone please tell me where to find a Larvesta? I want my new buddy to be able to DESTROY HIS ENEMIES

@BulbaBuddy_567 So pidgeychat crashes and the first thing she posts is a selfie covered in bugs. Just… what.

— @rhyhornrumble_44 … brave of you to say something before the “what” when not saying what crashed the internet

— @BulbaBuddy_567 I DIDN’T CRASH THE INTERNET

— @rhyhornrumble_44 that’s what someone guilty would say…

— @PikAurora_151 lol when Bulba breaks the pattern it’s a symbol of doom

— @wooperwhirl_888 @PikAurora_151 I mean, last time he broke the pattern we learned that one of the Indigo researchers died in the next post

— @BulbaBuddy_567 guYS

— @meowthmelody88 sorry Buddy, you’re our official doom check now

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@FrostBlastGlalie_275 Op op op ok that’s a lotta bug pokemon

— @rhyhornrumble_44 ye sorry phobia alert I guess

@BlazinChar_1234 WHAT IS A LARVESTA??? WHY WOULD IT DESTROY ENEMIES??? HELP???

@ZapThunderZubat_555 Hello yes I would like to y e e t into that

@IceBeamSquirtle_128 The bugs have gone off the internet and escaped to Vicky’s reality

— @MysticWarpGengar_666 Heh

— @meowthmelody88 why Vicky’s reality specifically?

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 @meowthmelody88 look at her posts and tell me this nutcase doesn’t live in a different plane of existence

@CharmanderCharm Aww this is adorable!!! Just so people know, those caterpie are very clearly happy. You can tell because their compound eyes are currently squinting, their bodies are straight and noodly, and their feelers have a slight curve to them. Defensive caterpies tend to curl up in a ball and straighten… [ Click to read more ]

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AquaRush_2000 The human mound

— @ZapTailPikachu_143 the caterpie mound with human

@DragonTwistite_42 HELLO??? WHY ARE YOU IN JOHTO????

— @MoonFrostJynx_456 because

— @jigglypuffpulse :3

— @AeroSlashDragon_321 lol she’s gonna wreck em

— @EeveeEnigma_96 I mean, logically…

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@Careful Caterpie_46 Controversial opinion: caterpies are CUTE

@MarillMuse_444 So… anyone else wondering what a Larvesta is?

— @ZubatZoomer_11 yes

— @ElectricZapster absolutely 

— @FlamewingRapid_789 “destroy his enemies”???

— @EeveeEnigma_96 more “concerned” than “wondering”

— @ZapThunderZubat_555 LOL 10 pokedollars that it’ll be another crazy mon

— @EeveeEnigma_96 @ZapThunderZubat_555 no way I’m taking that bet

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@IceBeamSquirtle_128 Gotta cater to the caterpie

— @PsyduckPulse23 oh Birds no there’s puns

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 @PsyduckPulse23 does it bug you?

— @PsyduckPulse23 @IceBeamSquirtle_128 >:(

— @IceBeamSquirtle_128 @ I suppose beauty is in the eye of the bee-holder

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@JynxJive_789 The comments section has devolved into puns and screaming. What another lovely day on the IronVictory page

✔︎ @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Done You break the internet… and THIS is the first thing you post???

— ✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Bug Besties Wdm I broke the internet? I thought they said something like a “request overload”

— ✔︎ @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Done Yes. Because of you.

— ✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Bug Besties But I didn’t do anything???

— ✔︎ @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Done You… You know what, f*** it, someone else explain this, I’m out

— ✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Bug Besties Oh yeah! Also congrats on the checkmark thing! I dunno what it means but Ivy said it was good

— ✔︎ @spiritpuppy132 | Kiba Is Done …

— @BlazinChar_1234 XD XD XD when you get a checkmark purely because you had to deal with Vicky

— @EmberFlareon_777 lol RIP Kiba

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✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Good Ghostie
Agatha! I made a friend! He’s a Gengar and he is so cute!
Comments 22.2k | Likes 25.1k | Rechirps 22k

@MisdreavusMystic42 Oooh are we gonna get more ghost representation on her team

— @ThunderQuakeOnix_007 I thought she had a full team?

— @PsyWaveEevee_199 Always room for more LOL

@PokeMystic_23 Okay. She’s at Morty. It’s been *checks notes* … a day and a half. Um. … what was the rate we were saying she’s doing gyms at again?

— @PsyduckPulse23 Mystic’s making notes again

— @EeveeEnigma_96 Uh oh

— @ElectricZapster Is she going out of order?

— @PokeMystic_23 @ElectricZapster PLEASE no I’ve worked this hard on my notes thus far I would legitimately go insane

— @AquaRush_2000 Fs in chat for Mystic

— @PsyduckPulse23 F

— @SnorlaxDreamzz_8888 f

— @FrostBlastGlalie_275 F

— @AquaSurgeGyarados_8888 Fff

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@MysticWarpGengar_666 Gengar representation wooo

@HydroVortexBlast_987 speedrunspeedrunspeedrun

— @BlazeWingPony_789 Vicky: I am SPEED

✔︎ @GengarRules_000 | Agatha E4 Oh excellent. Will you add a new ghostie to your team?

— ✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Good Ghostie nah, he’s Morty’s! Just wanna say he’s a good boy

— @TotodileSplash21 why is Agatha here. Just… why

— @SolarShockFlare_888 @TotodileSplash21 this isn’t even the first time, either

— @MoonFrostJynx_456 @TotodileSplash21 you new here?

— @PsyWaveEevee_199 Agatha!!!

— @PsySprintKadabra_321 Do you have any tips for training a ghost type

— @TwisterTail_42 @TotodileSplash21 Lance replied the other day

— @TotodileSplash21 @TwisterTail_42 what the actual Distortion is going on in Kanto

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✔︎ @SpookySports_44 | Morty Um. Uh. I know you said you knew Agatha but I didn’t realize you knew her well enough to have her FOLLOWING YOU ON PIDGEYCHAT—

— ✔︎ @IronVictory14 | Good Ghostie :D

— @ShadowPulseUmbreon_456 GlORioUs ChAoS

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✔︎ @SpookySports_44 | Morty You know, she’s not a bad kid

✔︎ @RolloutTheTanks | Whitney you’re just saying that bc she connected you with Agatha

✔︎ @prycewillow11 | Pryce hmph.

✔︎ @SpookySports_44 | Morty Yeah, yeah, we all know how you feel about Kanto, old man
✔︎ @SpookySports_44 | Morty Shush, Whitney
✔︎ @SpookySports_44 | Morty Oh, yeah, Bugsy! It was cool to see you! We haven’t really hung out or anything

✔︎ @HiveMind_B | Bugsy Yeah…

✔︎ @SpookySports_44 | Morty … oh right, ghost phobia